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SECTION vr 
NINETEENTH CENTURY POETS 



GENERAL EDITOR 

RICHARD BURTON, Ph.D. 




ALFRED TENNYSON 



AFTER THE PORTRAIT BY SAMUEL LAURENCE 



SELECT POEMS 

OF 

ALFRED TENNYSON 



EDITED BY 



ARCHIBALD MacMECHAN, Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH IN DALHOUSIE COLLEGE, HALIFAX 



BOSTON, U S. A., AND LONDON 

D. C. HEATH AND CO., PUBLISHERS 
1907 



A 



|uhnARYof COWGRESSJ 
Two Cooies Received | 

SEP 13 590/' 

Copynetrt Bnt?y 

CLASS /I ' XXc., No. 

f 3^7 eg 

COPY t3. 



Tl? s s- r 1 



COPYRIGHT, I9<yT, BY D. C. HEATH & CO. 
ALL RIGHTS RSSERVED 



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TO 



ALL LOYAL DALHOUSIANS 
(1889-1907) 

** Daran erkenn ich meitie Pappenheimer^* 




pttfatovv 0ott 



This volume of selections from the poetry of Tennyson 
has been compiled first for the delectation of all true lovers 
of noble verse, by a Tennysonian who can scarcely be 
brought to admit that the King can do wrong. The 
spectacle of little critics pertly taking the great masters to 
task for minor faults is not edifying: therefore the present 
commentator aims merely at being the interpreter of the 
poet, not his school-master, or literary adviser. In choos- 
ing poems for such a volume as this, the editor can be 
guided by the taste of the judicious few and by the hearty 
approval of the multitude of readers. He need include 
nothing of doubtful value, nothing of unacknowledged 
excellence. I hope I have done so. 

The purpose of the introduction is fourfold, to empha- 
size the exotic character of Tennyson' s verse, to set forth 
his artistic methods, to define the specially new note in 
his work, and to sketch his relation to his own age. The 
commentary makes no pretense at completeness} it is 
personal; it would be interpretive and suggestive. It 
implies access to ordinary works of reference; and it is 
written for Tennysonians only. 

Tennyson's extraordinary practice of self-criticism is 
fully illustrated only in the Ode on the Death of the Duke 
of Wellington. For this Professor Van Dyke courteously 
granted me permission to use the results of his scholarly 
edition. I am glad of this opportunity to thank him for 
his kindness. 

A. M. 



Contents! 



V 



Prefatory Note 

J xi 

Life 

Introduction I. The Exotic Nature of Tennyson's Poetry xv 

II. Tennyson the Artist xxi 

III. The New Note xxxvi 

IV. Tennyson the Poet of his Age . . . xlviii 

POEMS CHIEFLY LYRICAL. 1830 

The figures in parentheses refer to the pages of the Notes. 

Claribel (233) ' 

Mariana (233) * 

Recollections of the Arabian Nights. (234) 5 

The Dying Swan (235) " 

POEMS. 1833 

The Lady of Shalott (236) U 

Oenone (238) ^' 

To 3^ 

The Palace of Art (240) 33 

The Lotus-Eaters (242) 47 

A Dream of Fair Women ( 244) 5^ 

To J. S. (247) 70 

ENGLISH IDYLLS AND OTHER POEMS. 1842 

Morte D' Arthur (247) . . • 74 

The Gardener's Daughter (249) 86 



viii Contents; 

Dora (251) . , . . • 97 

Ulysses (252) 104 

St. Agnes' Eve (253) 107 

Sir Galahad (253) 109 

Edward Gray (254) 112 

The Lord of Burleigh (255) 114 

The Voyage (255) 1 18 

The Vision of Sin (256) 122 

'Break, break, break' (257) 132 

THE PRINCESS. 1847 
Songs 

The Falling Out (259) 133 

Lullaby (259) 133 

Bugle Song (259) 134 

Idle Tears (260) 135 

North and South (260) 1 36 

The Call to TVar\zei) 137 

The Call to Life {z^l) I38 

♦Male and Female Created He Them' (261) . . . . 138 

Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington (262) . . 14a 

The Northern Farmer, Old style (263) 155 

The Daisy (264) 161 

Will (265) 165 

Wages (266) . . 166 

The Higher Pantheism (266) 1 67 

IN MEMORIAM. 1850 

Proem. Lo-ve Victorious. (268) 1 70 

The Friend the Heart of All Things, cxxix. (269) . . . 1 72 



Contenw ix 

Burial at CUvedon. xix (269) 172 

College Re-visited. Lxxxviii (269) 1 73 

Holidays at Somersby. lxxxix (270) 175 

The Friend's Character, cix (270) 1 77 

The Friend'' s Eloquence, ex (271) 179 

^Gentleman'' Defined. cxi(27l) ........ 180 

The Friend's Letters, xcv (272) . 181 

Nature Pitiless. Lvi (272) 1 84 

The Heart's Revolt, cxxixl (273) 185 

The Goal of III. liv (274) 186 

The Larger Hope. Lv (274) 187 

God J Nature and the Friend, cxxx (274) 188 

Supplicatio. cxxxi (275) 189 

MAUD. 1855 

The Happy Lover (275) 190 

BALLADS AND OTHER POEMS. 1880 

Rizpah (277) 194 

The Revenge (278) 201 

TIRESIAS AND OTHER POEMS 

The Spinster's Sweet Arts (281) zio 

To Virgil (282) 220 

DEMETER AND OTHER POEMS 

Vastness (283) 222 

Merlin and the Gleam (^^4) 226 

Crossing the Bar (285) 232 

Notes 233 

Index of First Lines 287 



U(t 



Alfred Tennyson was born at Somersby rectory, Lincolnshire, 
on August 6, 1809. His father, the Rev. George Clayton Ten- 
nyson, was a man of varied gifts ; his mother, a woman of surpass- 
ing gentleness and sweetness, has been celebrated in Isabel and the 
closing lines of TAe Princess ; his brothers and sisters, a handsome, 
long-lived race, were a ** little clan of poets." Except for a short 
attendance at a brutal school at Louth, Tennyson was educated at 
home, until he was ready to enter Trinity College, Cambridge, in 
1828. Together with his brother Charles, he had published a vol- 
ume of imitative or derivative verse. Poems By Tivo Brothers^ in 
1827. 

At Trinity, he met a group of young men who afterwards be- 
came eminent in literature, such as Spedding, MDnes, Trench, Al- 
ford, Merivale and Kemble. With the most brilliant member of 
the group, Arthur Hallam, he formed a famous friendship, which 
left a deep imprint on his life work. In 1830, he published Poems 
chiefly Lyrical^ an unpretending volume which dates the begin- 
ning of a new movement in English literature. 

In 1 83 1, he left Cambridge without a degree, and, to judge by 
a sonnet of the time, not too well pleased with the conservatism of 
his university. His second volume. Poems, dated 1833, appeared 
about Christmas, 1832. On September 13, 1833, Hallam died sud- 
denly at Vienna. He was engaged to be married to Emily Tennyson : 
his death was a heavy blow to the poet. The same year, Tennyson 
began to compose the "Elegies", which afterwards grew into In 
Memoriam. After ten years of silence, he published English Idylls, 
1842, which secured his fame. In 1845, he was given a pension 



xii ILift 

of ;^aoo a year. In 1847, he published The Princess, his fairy- 
tale contribution to the " woman question." 

The year 1850 is Tennyson^ s annus mirahi/is ; after a long, drag- 
ging engagement, he was able to marry Miss Emily Sellwood, a 
niece of Sir John Franklin ; he was appointed Poet Laureate, 
on Wordsworth's death ; and he published what many think his 
greatest work, In Memoriam. In 1852, he wrote his chief offi- 
cial poem, his ode on the Iron Duke, the victor at Waterloo, 
the hero of the nation. While the Crimean war was raging, he 
published Maud, the noblest love-poem of the nineteenth century. 
It was loudly decried on its appearance ; a recent critic classes it 
with The Princess as a splendid failure ; but it stands alone in the 
poetry of our age, as a portrayal of deep, pure maiden passion for a 
maid. The year 1859 saw the issue of his four greatest Idylls of 
the King, Enid, Vi-vien, Elaine, and Guinevere. The publication 
of Balin and Balan in 1885, completed the one worthy poetic ver- 
sion of the Arthurian legend in English. He had built it up slowly, 
adding The Coming of Arthur, The Holy Grail, Pelleas and Et~ 
tarre, and The Passing of Arthur in 1870, The Last Tournament in 
1871, Gareth and Lynette in 1872, and, finally, in 1888, dividing 
Geraint and Enid into two parts. According to his practice of self- 
criticism, he added passages and improved single lines. Like Spen- 
ser, he wove allegory into the narrative ; in his own words, the epic 
shadows *' Sense at war with Soul." But, to quote Hazlitt, *' the 
allegory won't bite": the Idylls can be read simply as stories of the 
knightly days. In reality, his Elaines and Gareths, his Viviens and 
Lancelots are types of Victorian English men and women. In 
1864, he published Enoch Arden, one of his most popular poems. 
The name of the hero has passed into popular speech. 

^een Mary, which appeared in 1875, is the first of the poet's 
essays in the drama. It was succeeded the next year, by another 
historical •'closet" drama, Harold, v/Ynch. was dedicated, with 



Life 



Xlll 



Tennysonian magnanimity, to the first Earl of Lytton the son of 
the man who had abused him most virulently. Altogether, he 
wrote five other dramas, The Falcon, 1879, ^^* ^"/"j 1881, 
The Promise of May, 1882, Becket, 1884, The Foresters, 1892; 
of which, Becket, in Irving' s hands was a distinct theatrical success. 

The other notable part of Tennyson's production was the '* bal- 
lads " so-called, which appeared in the volumes of 1880 and 1885. 
These are really " dramatic monologues," somewhat in the man- 
ner of Browning. They revealed more fully to his admirers that 
aspect of his genius which had been already manifested in The 
Northern Farmer and The Grandmother, — his humor and his sym- 
pathetic insight into the lives and characters of the lowly. Of these 
"ballads," Rizpah is the most movingly tragic and was praised 
magnificently by Swinburne. 

Tennyson's career was an ideal poetic career. He produced, if 
not his best work, at least verse that would make minor reputations 
throughout his long life and even in his old age. Through his po- 
etry he attained wealth, honors, friends, commanding influence over 
two generations of English-speaking men and women. His merit 
was recognized in fitting ways by the great universities, by his Sov- 
ereign, and by the nation. On the 6th of October, 1892, he passed 
away quietly at Aldworth, an open Shakspere beside him, and the 
moonlight flooding the room. He was buried in Westminster 
Abbey among ''grateful England's overflowing dead." The Me- 
moir written by his son made plain to the world that the nobility of 
Tennyson's poetry was only the natural outcome of a life and char- 
acter essentially noble. 



9Introt)uctton 



I 

To us who were born and bred on this, the hither 
side, of the Atlantic, the poetry of Tennyson is, and 
must needs be, exotic. As time goes on and the two 
great branches of the English-speaking race, the insular 
and the continental, grow further and further apart in 
their separate development of national and social ideals, 
the more strange and foreign will his work appear to all 
who are not British born. The conditions of time and 
place that made or modified his verse are passing, if 
they have not actually passed away. It is quite improb- 
able that they will ever be renewed. To his own Eng- 
land, Tennyson is already the voice of a bygone age. 
To us of America, he sings of a world almost as remote 
and incredible as Fairyland. This region of romance is 
the England of the early nineteenth century, the first 
part of the Victorian era. His life, his surroundings, 
the institutions that went to form the man and his art 
are so different from our own, that part of his meaning 
and many of his subtleties escape us. Because he writes 
our mother tongue, we flatter ourselves that we under- 
stand him. In a measure, we may catch the air, but 
we miss the overtones. 

For Tennyson is an ultra English type. He is an 
exponent of the national shyness and love of privacy. 



xvi 31ntroliuction 

We live a public or communistic life, herding in flats, 
in hotels, in boarding-houses, conditions which make 
home in the old sense an impossibility. Throughout 
Tennyson's long life, his house was his castle. From 
birth to death, the poet was a recluse, as a child in a 
country rectory, as a student in an English college, as a 
country gentleman in haunts of ancient peace. When 
Farringford became infested with tourists, he built him- 
self the more inaccessible fastness of Aldworth. He at- 
tended an obsolete kind of college, in which the main 
interests of the students were literature, philosophy, 
politics and art, and not athletics. He grew up amid 
the rolling echoes of England's long, fierce, life-and- 
death struggle with Napoleon. His early manhood 
was passed in the era of those great political and social 
changes that made a new England. Throughout those 
changes, he remained a steadfast though moderate con- 
servative. His religion and philosophy were profoundly 
affected by the new scientific conceptions associated 
chiefly with the name of Darwin. He was a life-long 
admirer of the great state church into which he had been 
born. With it, he accepted, while he criticized, the 
social fabric as he found it. He was always a member 
of a society aristocratic in the literal sense, a society dis- 
tinguished by true refinement, intellectual culture, lofty 
ethical standards. The organization of the church, the 
system of education which he knew, cannot, without 
special study, be understood by Americans. The very 
landscape he describes, the very fauna and flora of his 
verse are strange and foreign to us. Indeed the literature 
of the daisy, the primrose, the daffodil, the cowslip, the 



31ntroUuction xvii 

violet must always remain but half comprehended by all 
who have not known those flowers from childhood. 
For us these common English wild-flowers, almost 
weeds, are lovely exotics. 

One example will do as well as a hundred. The 
appeal of such a verse as this falls absolutely dead on 
American ears. 

** The smell of violets, hidden in the green 

Pour' d back into my empty soul and frame 
The times when I remember to have been 
Joyful and free from blame." 

In the first place we do not see the picture, ** violets 
hidden in the green. ' * Our native violets have faint color 
and no perfume. English violets fill English meadows. 
Here they are nursed tenderly in hot-houses. Few of 
us have been so fortunate as to gather the shy blue blos- 
soms in an English May from the grass they hide among, 
while the hot sun fills the whole air with their delicate, 
intoxicating odor. In the next place, our associations 
with these flowers, no matter how intimately we know 
them, must be different from those who have seen them 
come every spring since childhood. English violets 
suggest to us damp florists* shops, engagements, and 
pretty girls on Sunday parade. The very last thing 
they could suggest to us is the child's Eden, the time 
of our innocence. For Tennyson, as for many of his 
English readers, the chain of association between the 
two is indissoluble. 

And the sense of the difference between Tennyson's 
world and our own grows stronger the more we study 



xviii ^Introduction 

his work. We have no eyes for the English posies with 
which the English poets strew their pages. We can- 
not perceive the woodland and garden odors those pages 
exhale. We have no ears for the note of the cuckoo, 
the carol of the lark, the music of the nightingale that 
ring and thrill through a thousand English poems. To 
us the poetry of the village church, of the cathedral 
close, the hedgerow, the lane, the park, the cottage, 
the castle, the ** great house," has one meaning, while 
for those whose lives have been spent with these things, 
it has another and quite different meaning. English 
readers bring to the interpretation of Tennyson a wealth 
of experience, association, affection we absolutely lack. 
We either miss that meaning altogether, or feel it vaguely, 
or translate it into terms of our own experience. Apart 
from their own value and significance, all these things 
are symbols of a life far separated from our own. 

Of this local English life, Tennyson is the chief poet. 
There is a certain insularity in him. His sympathies 
are limited. Critics like Taine and Dowden remark the 
English narrowness of his outlook, and they are right. 
He cultivated his poetic garden behind stone walls. Per- 
haps his most characteristic lines are 

*' There is no land like England 

Where'er the light of day be." 

There his heart speaks. This is the first article of his 
practical, working creed. Though he can find flaws 
in the social fabric, as in Jylmer* s Field and Locks ley 
Hall, he does not want it torn down, or a new-fangled 



31ntroDuction xix 

one take its place. He could not live in any other. 
Browning, his brother Olympian, ranges Europe and 
European literatures for subjects. Tennyson is gener- 
ally content to abide within the narrow seas and the 
marches of Scotland and Wales. He loves freedom, 
but it must be freedom of the English pattern. He is 
thoroughly English in his attitude toward foreigners, 
«* the lesser breeds without the law. " He is more Eng- 
lish than even Wordsworth, who, though he began as 
a red Republican, ended as a Tory and a high Church- 
man. Still in his fervid youth, Wordsworth could dance 
around the table hand in hand with the Marsellaise 
delegates to the Convention for pure joy at the Revolu- 
tion. In the ** men of July," in the barricades of '48, 
Tennyson could see only **the red fool-fury of the 
Seine.'* In Scotland, Wordsworth is moved to song 
by the braes of Yarrow, the grave o( Rob Roy and the 
very field where Burns plowed up the daisy. In Edin- 
burgh, it is true, Tennyson writes of the daisy, but it 
is a withered flower in a book, which recalls not Bums 
or Scotland, but his own visit to Italy. 

The friendliest critic must concede that Tennyson's 
sympathies are limited, that his outlook is rather narrow, 
that his thinking is somewhat restricted by English 
conventions, that his subjects are by preference English 
subjects and his landscapes are English landscapes. In 
a word, he is not a universal, but a local, poet, a singer 
of the land he was born into, of the one time he knew. 
This may be considered his weakness, but it is also his 
strength. This is a great excellence, to body forth the 



XX 3|ntroOuction 

thoughts and aspirations, to interpret in song the life of 
a nation throughout one stage of its progress toward 
its unknown goal. 

The charm of England for the American traveller is 
special and unique. Irving tried to express it in The 
Sketch-booky Hawthorne tried to express it in Our 
Old Home, Howells tried to express it in English 
Films. This charm is made up of many parts, the 
soft, domestic landscape, the evidence on every hand 
of a rich, ordered, long established civilization, the 
historical and literary associations. What the well 
attuned observer feels from without, Tennyson, the 
son of the soil, feels from within. His poetry is 
steeped in it, and moves in a pure, fine atmosphere 
of beauty, of dignity, of elevated thought, of noble 
emotion. So thorough an Englishwoman as Thackeray's 
daughter wrote: ** One must be English born, 1 think, 
to know how English is the spell which this great 
enchanter casts over us ; the very spirit of the land 
descends upon us, as the visions he evokes come clos- 
ing round." England cannot possibly be as beautiful 
as Tennysonland, for over that broods the consecration 
and the poet's dream. Still it is a fair land, rich in 
natural beauty, rich in memories of great deeds, rich 
in great men, a mother of nations. How far soever 
the various branches of our race may diverge, our 
common literature must remain a great bond, a force 
making for unity. So the poetry of Tennyson will 
long continue to the new nations the symbol of what 
was noblest in the life of the home island, a rallying- 



3|ntroUuction xxi 

point for those souls that are touched to the finest 
issues. The wise Goethe declares that whoever wishes 
to understand a poet must journey to the poet's land. 
It is also true that the poetry arouses interest in the 
poet's land and leads us to think well of the people he 
represents. So may a study of verse lead to a mutual 
knowledge in nations, that more and more perfect 
understanding which makes for the harmony of the 
world and was Tennyson's own dream. 

II 

Tennyson has been greatly praised as a moralist, a 
philosopher and a religious teacher. He is not without 
significance under every one of these aspects, but 
under none of them did he first come before the world. 
He was first, last, and always an artist, an artist born, 
an artist by training, an artist to the tips of his fingers 
and to the marrow of his bones. He belongs to that 
small band of illuminated spirits to whom the universe 
reveals itself chiefly as wonder and beauty. They live 
in the credo of Fra Lippo Lippi, 

* ' If you get simple beauty and naught else 
You get about the best thing God invents." 

They can never rest until they have embodied their 
visions in outward form. Haunted by both the rapture 
of achievement and the heavy consciousness of failure, 
they strive to interpret this basal principle of the uni- 
verse into color, or bronze, or marble, or tone, or 
sweet-flowing words. From youth to age, Tennyson 



xxii 3IntroDuction 

is an artist whose chosen medium is language, a seer 
who renders into words the visions of beauty vouchsafed 
to his eyes ; he is a singer, a poet. 

Lilce Milton he dedicated his whole long Ufe to his 
art. He held no office, he adopted no bread-winning 
profession. He never deviated into prose. His pro- 
gramme of self-culture was never interrupted by any 
Latin secretaryship, still less by two decades of noisy 
pamphleteering. Like Milton, he set out with a lofty 
conception of the poet's vocation. He, too, would first 
make himself a true poem if he would not be frustrate 
of his hope to write well hereafter in laudable things. 
He was not content to be the idle singer of an empty 
day, like Morris, though perhaps he did aspire on the 
other hand to be, like Shelley, one of the unacknow- 
ledged legislators of the world. He is himself the best 
example of his own description. 

* ' The poet in a golden clime was born, 
With golden stars above ; 
Dower' d with the hate of hate, the scorn of scorn, 
The love of love." 

The poet is a seer ; he is an influence ; through him 
truth is multiplied on truth until the world shows like 
one great garden: freedom which is wisdom arises and 
shakes the world with the poet's scroll. Few youthful 
poets have had a more beautiful dream of the poet's 
place and power. The golden cHme he is born into is 
lighted by the same golden stars that shone upon 
Spenser's realm of faerie. To every aura of beauty he 
is tremblingly alive. The alluring mysteries, the puz- 



3|ntroDuction xxiii 

zling revelations of the loveliness of women, the form 
and color of the visible world, dreams and flowers and 
the morning of the times, — of these he is the youthful 
interpreter. His earliest poems dwell apart 

** In regions mild of calm and serene air 
Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot 
That men call Earth." 

It seems as if nothing ever could perturb that ample, 
tranced, pellucid ether. He is himself an unwitting 
prisoner in his own Palace of Art, until the bolt that 
struck down the friend at his side shattered also the 
airy dome of that stately fabric and left him desolate to 
all the bleak winds of the world. But from the very 
dawn of consciousness till its eclipse in death, he fol- 
lowed hard after the Gleam. 

The record shows him to have been an artist in all 
parts of his life. He thought of his work as a painter 
thinks of his, considering subjects, studying them, se- 
lecting some, rejecting others, making large plans, 
meditating form, outline, disposition of masses, detail, 
ornament, finish. He harvested his thoughts, he even 
garnered in his dreams. He made his plein air sketches 
which he afterwards worked up carefiilly in the studio. 
He was not perfect at first ; he made errors, but he per- 
sisted and he attained to mastery. He lived for and in 
his art and at last his art enabled him to live. He had the 
artist's patience : he was, in his own phrase, a man of 
long enduring hopes. He could be silent for ten years, 
the ten precious years between twenty and thirty when 
the work of most poets is done and over. He could 



xxiv 3|ntroDuction 

build slowly through seventeen years the lofty rhyme 
of his elegies in memory of his friend enskied and 
sainted; and he could follow out the plan of his Idylls 
for forty. His poetic career is the career oi a star, un- 
lasting but unresting. He offers for our acceptance no 
fragments, only completed things. At the same time, 
he had the artist's fury, composing Enoch Arden in a 
fortnight, or The Revenge in a few days, after keep- 
ing the first line on his desk for years. He had his fre- 
quent hours of inspiration when he waited mystically 
for things to ** come " to him. Crossing the Bar, 
♦* came " thus. Another mark of the true artist was his 
insatiable hunger and thirst after perfection. Deep down 
in his nature burned an unquenchable contempt for weak- 
lings who set the ** how much before the how." In his 
ears sullen Lethe sounded perpetually, rolling doom on 
man and on all the work of his hands. His inmost con- 
viction was that nothing could endure, and yet in his 
humility, he held nothing fit for the inevitable sacrifice 
but his very best. 

How did Tennyson become an artist ? Taught by 
Taine, we are now no longer content merely to accept 
the fact of genius, we must account for it; at least we 
must try to solve the problem. We feel that it is laid 
upon us to explain this revelation of the spirit that is in 
man. All methods must be used to discover the Xy 
the unknown quantity. The favorite form of the equa- 
tion is: 

original endowment + race + environment = x. 



3flntrot)uction xxv 

In a Byron, the problem is simplicity itself. His 
father is a handsome rake, his mother is a fool, a fury, 
an aristocratic sympathizer with the Revolution; his 
narse is a Scottish Presbyterian ; he is brought up amid 
Highland scenery. Hence it follows that George 
Gordon will be a libertine, a poet of libertinism and 
liberty, a singe of revolt and protest, a lover of moun- 
tains, a timid sceptic. In a Ruskin, the problem pre- 
sents few difficulties. His father is ** an entirely honest 
merchant ' ' who is able to take his young son to see all 
the best pictures and all the best scenery in Europe. 
His mother educates him in the noble EngUsh of 
King James's Bible. His childish delight is in study- 
ing the pattern of the dining-room carpet. Inevitably 
John Ruskin will grow into a supreme art-critic, with 
a style of unrivalled pliancy and beauty. But with 
Tennyson the method of Taine breaks down. There 
seems to be nothing in his early life or training to make 
him a poet. True, his brothers and sisters were ** a 
little clan of poets," and he himself lisped in numbers. 
But he lived until manhood nearly in a tiny retired 
hamlet, a perfect Robinson Crusoe's Island for seclu- 
sion, in a flat, uninteresting part of England, without 
the mental stimulus of travel or contact with the 
world. Arthur Hallam, the brilliant Etonian, spending 
his holidays on the Continent, meeting the most dis- 
tinguished men and women of the time, in his own 
father's house is plainly in process of becoming a man 
of letters, while his predestined friend, reading, dream- 
ing, making verses in the quiet of Somersby rectory, 
enjoys none of these advantages. ** The wind bloweth 



xxvi 31ntroOuction 

where it listeth and thou hearest the sound thereof but 
canst not tell whither it cometh." 

Still the boy Tennyson composed unweariedly in 
verse. At eighteen, he pubUshed with his brother a 
volume of juvenilia, which are plainly imitative and 
derivative. It fell dead from the press. At twenty-one, 
he pubHshed a volume of poems, which dates the begin- 
ning of a new chapter in the long, majestic chronicle of 
English literature. What made the diiference? What 
changed the literary mocking-bird into the new poet ? 
My answer is, Cambridge. The most momentous act 
in Tennyson's whole life was going up to the uni- 
versity in 1828. No later experience, not grief for 
Hallam's death, not the discipline of his ten silent 
years, not the reward of wedded life after long wait- 
ing, not the laureateship and his many other honors, 
not the birth and death of his sons could mould his life 
and genius, as did that scant three years' residence at 
Cambridge. But for Cambridge and Trinity College, 
he could never have made his life-long friends, Hallam, 
Spedding, Brookfield, the ** Apostles" ; and Tenny- 
son's friendships had no small or trivial influence on 
his life. At that time, he was not conscious of his 
debt, and wrote a sonnet prophesying dire things for 
his university when the day-beam should sport o'er 
Albion, because **you," (the authorities) 

*' teach us nothing, feeding not the heart," 

This is as it should be. Youthful genius should dis- 
parage university systems ; they are calculated for the 



31ntroOuctton xxvii 

average, not for the exceptional, academic person. But 
Tennyson could not escape the influence of Cambridge ; 
it was much greater than he knew. Cambridge colors 
much of his poetry ; for example, the architecture in The 
Princess and The Palace of Art is the English collegi- 
ate order glorified. He has left us no second Prelude ^ or 
growth of a poet's mind to guide investigation. The Me- 
moir itself does not convey as much information as can 
be gathered from the poet's own hints and reminiscences 
in In Memoriam. The intercourse with equal minds 
for the first time in his life, during his most plastic years 
counted for most; but even the despised university sys- 
tem itself was not without its formative power. The 
Cambridge undergraduate who had written Poems chiejly 
Lyrical hy twenty-one, was very diiFerent from the boy 
of eighteen who collaborated in Poems By Two Brothers. 
Cambridge and Cambridge men made the difference, 
or nothing did. His college days were the budding-time 
of Tennyson's genius. 

As Birrell has pointed out with so much humor, 
Cambridge and not Oxford is the mother of most Eng- 
lish poets who are also university men. The university 
of Spenser, Milton, Dryden, Wordsworth, Coleridge, 
Byron was also Tennyson's. He is in the direct line 
of a great tradition. When he came up, he seems to 
have become at once a member of a brilliant group of 
young men, by some sort of undisputed right, and the 
most brilliant member of that group became his most 
intimate friend. Since the days of David and Jonathan, 
no friendship has been more deep and tender or em- 



xxviii ^Introduction 

balmed in nobler poetry. The two were in physique a 
complete contrast, the contrast of the oak and the birch 
tree. Both were six feet in height, but Tennyson was 
massive in build, broad-shouldered and notably strong 
looking, while Hallam was slight and gracefully slim. 
Tennyson was dark brown in hair, eyes and complex- 
ion, ** Indian-looking," ** like an Italian," as he has 
been described. Hallam was the familiar blonde Saxon 
type, with fair hair, blue eyes and regular features. 
Both had the distinction of great personal beauty. Law- 
rence's portrait ^ shows the poet in his youth looking as 
a young poet should look, ** a sort of Hyperion," Fitz- 
Gerald called him ; and Chantrey's bust of Hallam 
portrays the finest type of English gentleman. Two 
more noticeable youths never wore cap and gown in 
Cambridge, or paced together ** that long walk of 
limes." Their unlikeness in manner and mental gifts 
was equally marked. Tennyson was the country boy, 
shy, reserved, a trifle awkward, Hallam was al- 
ready the easy, polished man of the world. Tennyson 
was silent, a quiet figure in a corner of a noisy room : 
Hallam was fluent, and shone in conversation and dis- 
cussion. Tennyson's was the slower, stronger, deeper 
nature ; Hallam 's the more brilliant and attractive per- 
sonality. Tennyson was more of the artist ; Hallam 
was more of the philosopher. Hallam was the acknow- 
ledged leader, the young man, who, everyone was cer- 
tain, would go far. Tennyson was the poet, admired 
and honored greatly by these fortunate undergraduates 
who first listened to the bard chant his own poems 
* See frontispiece. 



3|ntro0uction xxix 

Oriana or The Hesperidesy mouthing his hollow oes and 
tfes. Their friendship was the attraction of opposites, 
mutual, intimate, untroubled. The seal was set upon 
the bond by Hallam's betrothal to the sister of his friend. 

It seems probable that Hallam did for Tennyson 
at Cambridge what Coleridge did for Wordsworth at 
Nether Stowey. The keen intellectual interests stirring 
in that remarkable little coterie must in themselves have 
worked powerfully upon his mind and formed a con- 
genial atmosphere in which his genius might blossom. 
But Hallam's affection, sympathy, admiration seem to 
have done even more for him ; and his acute, alert, 
philosophic intelligence in free interplay with Tenny- 
son's more vague and dreamy thought seems to have re- 
leased and stimulated the powers of the poet's mind. 
No record remains of the discussions of the ** youthful 
band" so lovingly sketched in In Memoriam. In his 
friendship with Hallam seems to lie the secret of Ten- 
nyson's rapid early development. 

Cambridge completed the education which had been 
carried on at home under his father's direction, a sin- 
gularly old-fashioned scholarly training, classical in a 
narrow sense. Tennyson was not like Shelley a rebel 
against routine ; nor, like Byron, a restless seeker of 
adventures, nor, Hke Scott, a sportsman, a lover of dogs 
and horses. He did not, like Browning, educate him- 
self. Books were his world. His love for the classics 
was deep and real, as his exquisite tribute to Virgil 
proves, and their influence is unmistakable everywhere 



XXX 3(lnti:oUuction 

throughout his work.^ From his classical training he 
gained his unerring sense for the values of words, his 
love of just proportion, his hterary ** temperance, " his 
restraint in all effects, emotional and picturesque. 
** Nothing too much" was a principle he followed 
throughout his poetic career. From classical example he 
learned the labor of the file, a labor he never stinted. He 
practiced the Horatian maxim about suppressing until 
the ninth year. He knew well how to prize the creation 
that comes swift and perfect in a happy hour; he knew 
well the danger of changing and altering many times, 

" Till all be ripe and rotten," 

but he had a great patience in finish,** the damascening 
on the blade of the scimitar " as one critic calls it. 
Finish, rightly understood, is but an untiring quest of 
truth. The pursuit of the mot juste , the matching of the 
colors of words, the exactness in the shading of phrases 
are no more than stages in a process of setting forth the 
poet's conception with simple truth. To rest con- 
tent with a form of words which merely approximates 
to the expression of the idea is, to a mind of Tennyson's 
temper, to be guilty of falsity. 

In his choice of themes, as well as in his manner, 
Tennyson's love of the classics is made manifest. He 
prefers romantic themes, notably the Arthurian sagas, 
but his devotion to the myths of Hellas is life-long. 
(Enone is one of the chief beauties of the volume of i 83 2. 

^ See Dr. Mustard's admirable Classical Echoes In Tennyson^ for 
convincing demonstration. 



3|ntroDuction xxxi 

The Death of (Enone, a continuation of the same tale 
gives the title to his very last. It is only necessary to 
mention Ulyssesy Tithonus, Lucretiusy Tiresias. While 
at Cambridge, he came under the influence of Theocritus 
as Stedman " has shown; and the Sicilian muse inspired 
his Efiglish Idylls y the poems of 1 842, which established 
his rank as a poet. Tennyson's classicism is very differ- 
ent from the classicism of Pope on the one hand, and the 
classicism of Keats, Morris and Swinburne on the other. 
" Pope and his school had zeal without knowledge; 
they had the misfortune to live before Winckelmann. 
Keats by instinct and sympathy, Morris and Swinburne 
through study and sympathy, attain to an understanding 
of Hellenic literature and life. Tennyson's sympathy 
is founded on scholarship, but he is not content merely 
to reproduce Hellenic forms, as Swinburne does in 
Atala7ita in Calydony or merely to interpret in re-telling, 
an old-world wonder-tale, as Keats does in Hyperion, 
or as Morris does in Atalantd* s Race. His practice is to 
take the mould of the old mythus and fill it with new 
metal of his own fusing. If Keats or Swinburne had 
written CEnone, they would have given more ''Judg- 
ment of Paris " pictures, glowing with splendid color. 
Tennyson does not deny us beauty, or harmony, or form, 
or vivid hue, but his (Enone is in its last significance **a 
criticism of life." This modernity is, I believe, the 
distinctive note of all his classical poetry. 

Cambridge and the classics seem to be the chief in- 
fluences in developing Tennyson's genius, in bringing 
* Victorian Poets. 



xxxii 3|ntroliuction 

out the artist that was in him. A third influence was 
his extraordinary habit of self-criticism, a bent of 
mind rarely found united with the artistic temperament. 
The personality of Tennyson is a curious union of 
diverse qualities. A mystic, a dreamer, who could, by 
repeating his own name as a sort of incantation, put 
himself into the ecstatic state, he had a large fund of 
English common sense, driving shrewd bargains ' with 
his book-sellers and thriftily gaining houses and lands. 
He was both a critic and a creator, and his critical 
faculty, strong as it was, never crippled or overcame 
his creative power. In regard to his own work, he 
was both markedly sensitive and preeminently sane. 
Black-blooded, as he said himself, hke all the Tenny- 
sons, he never forgot or forgave an adverse criticism ; 
but he had humor and a power of detachment. He 
was too wise to think that he could ever have done 
with learning, and he was willing to learn even from 
unfriendly critics. When ** Scorpion" Lockhart stung 
him to the quick in the ^arterly^ or ** musty Chris- 
topher " bludgeoned him in Blackwood' s^ he could not 
help feeling hurt, but neither could he help seeing 
whatever justice was mingled with the abuse. In sub- 
sequent editions, he suppressed poems that they hit 
hardest, and removed or modified phrases that they 
ridiculed. Among poets, Tennyson stands alone in this 
peculiar deference to the opinions of others, and this 

^ J. V. Jackson of Louth actually paid the " Two Brothers " ten 
pounds for their "poems"; and from Effingham Wilson, Tenny- 
son received eleven pounds. Most poets begin by publishing at 
their own expense. 



3|ntroDuction xxxiii 

habit of profiting by criticism, while resenting it. 
Most poets take Pilate's attitude, ** What I have writ- 
ten, I have written." 

But Tennyson was his own best critic. He had 
keener eyes for flaws in his work than the Lockharts 
and the Wilsons, and a deeper interest in removing them. 
Unweariedly he labors onwards to the goal he has set be- 
fore himself, — perfection. He suppresses whole poems, 
parts of poems, or lines, or stanzas. At need he enlarges 
a poem. Constantly he modifies words and phrases. 
It would be difficult to point to a single poem that has 
not undergone correction since its first pubHcation. The 
Memoir showed how much good verse he never pub- 
lished, consistently with his praise of the poet, 

' * The worst he kept, the best he gave. ' ' 

And Tennyson's ** worst" is enough to make the 
reputation of a respectable minor poet. One of his 
firmest poetic principles was a horror of ** long-backed'* 
poems, against which he warned his friend Browning in 
vain. With Poe, he would almost consider ** long 
poem," a contradiction in terms; and with classic Gray, 
he is capable of sacrificing excellent verses " for no 
other reason than that they would draw out the linked 
sweetness beyond appointed bounds. He held that a 
small vessel, built on fine lines, is hkely to float farther 
down the stream of time than a big raft. The student 
of Tennyson's art will be rewarded by comparing the 
volumes of 1830 and 1832, with the first volume of 
1842. The first two were carefully winnowed for the 

* Notably in The Palace of Art. 



xxxiv 3(lncrotiuction 

best; and these were in some cases practically rewritten 
to form volume one of English Idylls. The second con- 
tained only new poems. These poems established his 
reputation; and FitzGerald maintained to the end, that 
they were never surpassed by any later masterpieces. 

From the opposite practice he was not averse, when 
it was necessary in the interests of truth and of complete- 
ness. Maudf for instance, was increased by the addition 
of two poems, sections xix and xxv, or one hundred 
and twelve lines altogether. The gain in clearness is 
most marked. Again, the amplification of the Idylls of 
the Ktngy notably of Geraint and Enid into two parts, 
and of the original Morte Darthur into The Passing of 
Arthur y to form a pendent for The Coming of Arthur 
rounds out the epic and assists the allegory. 

It was in verbal changes, however, that his critical 
faculty was chiefly exerted. As a boy, Horace was 
in his own phrase ** thoroughly drummed" into him, 
and, though he did not attain early to a full apprecia- 
tion of the Augustan 's peculiar excellences, such train- 
ing could hardly fail to re-act upon his own style, and 
direct his attention to the importance of nicety of phrase 
and melody of verse. In *« our harsh, grunting, North- 
ern guttural," he had much more stubborn material to 
work upon than the sonorous Latin ; but he triumphed. 
He revealed latent beauties in our tongue, unknown 
and unsuspected. One principle was what he called 
** kicking the geese out of the boat," getting rid of the 
sibilants. He would ridicule the first line of The Rape 



3(IntroUuction xxxv 

of the Lock for its cumulation of hissing sounds. To 
make his English sweet upon the tongue was one of 
his first concerns. He succeeded and he showed our 
language to be a richer, sweeter instrument of expres- 
sion, with greater compass than had been thought pos- 
sible before he revealed his mastery over it. In all his 
processes of correcting, polishing, emending expression, 
his one aim is the attainment of greater accuracy, in 
one word, truth. A characteristic anecdote is recorded 
in the Memoir. ** My father was vexed that he had 
written, * two and thirty years ago,' in his, *A11 along the 
Valley,' instead of, * one and thirty years ago,' and as late 
as 1892 wished to alter it since he hated inaccuracy. 
I persuaded him to let his first reading stand, for the pub- 
lic had learnt to love the poem in its present form ; and 
besides * two and thirty' was more melodious." Polish 
for the sake of mere smoothness was repellent to his large, 
sincere nature ; and he understood the art of concealing 
his art. The various readings in the Ode on the Death 
of the Duke of Wellington in the present edition illustrate 
the nature of Tennyson's textual emendation. Before 
him, only Wordsworth had treated his printed works 
in so rude a fashion ; but Wordsworth changes some- 
times for the worse. It is hardly too much to say that 
Tennyson's changes are invariably improvements. 

It seems then permissible to refer the peculiar de- 
velopment of Tennyson's genius to three causes; first, 
his education in the classics at home, at college, and 
throughout his after life as a means of self culture; sec- 
ond, the strong stimulus to mind and spirit aiForded by 



xxxvi 3(lntroDuctton 

the life and the companionships of the university; and 
third, the habit of self-criticism, which made the poet 
the most severe judge of his own work. 

• III 

That thin little volume with the modest title Poems 
Chiefly Lyrical issued by a Cambridge undergraduate 
of one-and-twenty marked the opening of a new era 
in English literature. Those Poems set the tune for all 
the English singers of a century. Browning was the 
other great poet of the time, but he was long in win- 
ning a hearing and he founded no school. But from 
1850, Tennyson's influence is dominant: he has a 
host of imitators. Even the men of marked individ- 
uality, Swinburne, Arnold, WilUam Morris, Rosetti 
are inconceivable without Tennyson. Unless Tenny- 
son had written as he did write, their verse would 
have been something diiferent. They were all taught 
by him. The smaller men, the fifty minor poets, the 
poetlets, poetlings, poetasters, echo from every side 
Tennyson's inimitable qualities, his refinement of work- 
manship and tone, his minute observation of nature, 
his predilection for the gently beautiful. His humour 
and his dramatic power, which are later developments, 
remain his own. On the verse of the Victorian age 
from the least to the greatest, except on Browning's, 
the imprint of Tennyson is broad and unmistakable. 
This popularity, this influence, the poet himself under- 
stood thoroughly; and he has put the case in the form 
of a simple parable. The Flower, 



31utrotJuction xxxvii 

" Once in a golden hour 
I cast to earth a seed j 
Up there came a flower, 
The people said a weed." 

Which means, being interpreted, that Blackwood and 
The Quarterly had abused his early work. But fame 
comes; the flower, curst at the beginning, grows tall 
and wears a crown of light. Thieves steal the seed 
and sow it broadcast, ** By every town and tower.'* 
Then the people praise it, — ** Splendid is the 
flower !" 

'< Read my little fable: 

He that runs may read. 
Most can raise the flowers now, 
For all have got the seed. 

*' And some are pretty enough, 
And some are poor indeed, 
And now again the people 
Call it but a weed. ' ' 

Perhaps it is a trifle hard to call his sincere flatterers 
** thieves." They were merely charmed by his ex- 
cellences, they fell into his mannerisms, they aspired 
to reach fame by the road he had made so broad and 
easy. Still the little fable is a useful summation of 
much literary history and criticism. 

Tennyson's popularity being undoubted, the question 
naturally arises, — What caused that popularity ? How 
did Tennyson's verse differ from what had gone before .? 
What reason can be given for this widespread imita- 
tion .? What was the new note ? Whence came the 



xxxviii 3IntroUuction 

fresh impalse to poetic creation in an age given over to 
machinery, commerce, science and scepticism ? 

As critics have pointed out, Tennyson came upon 
the stage when it was as good as empty. The poets 
of the preceding age, Keats, Shelley and Byron were 
dead. Scott and Coleridge were still aHve but had long 
ceased to produce verse. The most considerable figure 
was the veteran Wordsworth who had still twenty 
years to live, but whose ^ best work was done. Al- 
though his fame was growing steadily towards its 
culmmation about 1850, the prevailing influence was 
still Byron, an influence which was waning and was to 
disappear before the gospel of work, and of hero-worship 
preached with rude fervor by a Scottish prophet, then 
sojourning in Craigenputtock. How great was that in- 
fluence is illustrated in Tennyson's own case. He said 
himself: ** As a boy I was a tremendous admirer of 
Byron, so much so that I got a surfeit of him. . . . 
I was fourteen when I heard of his death. It 
seemed an awful calamity; I remember I rushed out- 
of-doors, sat down by myself, shouted aloud and wrote 
on the sandstone : * Byron is dead / ' " This testi- 
mony is corroborated by the evidence of the Poems by 
Two Brothers. These juvenilia, as has been said, are 
imitative and derivative; and the author most frequently 
imitated is Byron. No fewer than five sets of verses 
by Alfred Tennyson are in the metre of The Destruc- 
tion of Sennacherib. There is also a poem by Charles 
Tennyson on Byron's death in the metre of The 
Two Voices f beginning. 



31ntroDuction xxxix 

*' The hero and the bard is gone ! 
His bright career on earth is done, 
Where with a connet's blaze he shone." 

In Poems Chiefly Lyric al^ on the other hand, there is 
absolutely no trace of Byron' s influence. In Tennyson's 
later work, such as Maud and Locksley Hally it may 
perhaps be said to reappear ; but the difference between 
the work Tennyson was content to publish in 1827 and 
the work to which he attached his own name in 1830 
is almost incredible. There seems to be no common 
term, except possibly a certain aptness and refinement 
of phrasing, which may now be recognized as distinctly 
Tennysonian. When the contrast is considered, it 
seems clear that between 1827 and 1830, Tennyson's 
poetical powers must have developed with great rapid- 
ity. 

Though Byron's influence is absent in the poems of 
1830, spiritual kinship between the new poet and an 
elder poet was at once discerned by both friends and foes. 
That poet was Keats. The astonishing thing is that not 
a trace of Keats can be found in the Poems By Two 
Brothers ; nor is it recorded that Tennyson as a youth 
admired or read Keats as he read and admired Byron. 
No one, not even the hostile critic, asserts that he im- 
itates Keats or derives from him ; but one and all rec- 
ognize a relationship between the two. In forwarding 
his friend's poems to Leigh Hunt for review on Jan. i i , 
I 83 I, Hallam praises Tennyson as ** the true heir to 
Keats." In his review in The E?iglishman* s Magazine 
for August, 1 83 I , he compares the two, to Tennyson's 



xl JIntroDuction 

advantage. ** We think he has more dcfiniteness and 
roundness of conception than the late Mr. Keats and 
is much more free from blemishes of diction and hasty 
capriccios of fancy." Wilson, though really more se- 
vere on the favorable critics than on Tennyson, identi- 
fies him with ** Cockney dom." Lockhart is more expli- 
cit. ^ He introduces Tennyson as ** a new prodigy of 
genius — another and a brighter star of that galaxy or 
milky zvay of poetry of which the late lamented Keats 
was the harbinger." Bulwer continues the same gibe 
in his New Timon,'^ in which he calls Tennyson's 
poetry 

" The jingling medley of purloined conceits 
Out-babying Wordsworth ' and out-glittering Keats." 

All this is instructive as showing how the new poet 
strikes his contemporaries. 

The testimony is then practically unanimous. Ten- 
nyson is praised for being like Keats; he is blamed for be- 
ing like Keats. In this one thing, his resemblance to Keats, 
the hostile and the friendly points of view agree. It 
remains to analyze this general impression more min- 
utely, in order to recover the effect produced by Tenny- 
son's early work upon the minds of his first readers, 
and to ascertain what seemed to them decisively new 
in it. For this purpose, there is nothing better than 

^ The ^arterly Reviezv, July, 1833. 

^ "The New Timon ; a Romance of London," 1845. 

5 In criticising The Grasshopper, Wilson said, " but Tennyson 
out Wordsworths Wordsworth." Blackwood's Magazine, May, 
1832, p. 731. 



JlntroUuction xli 

Hallam's forgotten critique in The Englishman' s Maga- 
zine, If his estimate seems now too enthusiastic, as it 
undoubtedly seemed at the time to Lockhart and Wil- 
son, we must remember that a friend is writing about 
a friend, that Hallam wrote from the vantage ground 
of intimate personal knowledge and that Hallam was 
right. Time and cooler judgment have confirmed his 
opinions. 

First in importance for the present purpose, though 
not first in order, Hallam notes Tennyson's originality. 
The new poet has a new song. ** The author imitates 
nobody ; . . . His thoughts bear no more resem- 
blance to Byron or Scott, Shelley or Coleridge, than to 
Homer or Calderon, Firdusi or Calidasa." Bowring, 
who did not know Tennyson, shares with Hallam the 
glory of discovering the new star just rising in the 
heavens of literature. His long review in the Westmin- 
ster contains two sentences which are absolutely pro- 
phetic. **That these poems will have a very rapid and 
extensive popularity we do not anticipate. Their very 
originality will prevent their being generally appreci- 
ated for a time." Tennyson's early poems are unlike 
what had gone before; their originality ^/V prevent them 
from being generally appreciated for a time. Like 
Wordsworth, he had to create the audience by which 
he was enjoyed. 

Next the young critic remarks ** five distinctive 
excellencies" of Tennyson's own manner. First his 
luxuriance of imagination, and at the same time, his 



xlii 3|ntroDuction 

control over it. ' ' To define imagination or to discuss its 
functions would carry. us too^ar afield. It is the pro- 
phetic faculty of the mind which out of a mass of ideas 
seizes on those which separately are disagreeable, but 
in combination are harmonious. **By its operation, 
two ideas are chosen out of an infinite mass . . . two 
ideas which are separately wrong, which together shall 
be right, and of whose unity, therefore, the idea must 
be formed at the instant they are seized, as it is only in 
that unity that either are good, and therefore only the 
conception of that unity can prompt the preference ^ * 
Now, no one will deny that Tennyson has imagination, 
and rich imagination, and that he has that faculty under 
control. To read the twenty-two poems he rejected 
along with the thirty-one he retained and rewrote is to 
walk at dawn in Spring amid visions of light and air. 

The second ** excellency is his power of embody- 
ing himself in ideal characters, or rather moods of char- 
acter." The correction is not superfluous. With the 
fulness of his powers, Tennyson designs characters with 
masterly force and precision, such as the two Northern 
Farmers, but in the early poems, he represents what 
Hallam rightly calls ** moods of character. " The most 
notable illustration is The Ballad of Oriana. In this the 
central situation, is a beloved woman, slain by chance- 
medley between two enemies in something the same 

* Ruskin, Modern Painters, Part iii. sec. ii. ch. ii. Of Imagi- 
ration Associati've. The non-metaphysical reader is referred to this 
and the following chapters for a brilliant and informing discussion of 
the whole question. 



31ntroDuction xiiii 

manner as in Helen of Kirkcomiely a ballad which 
Tennyson was often asked to declaim in his undergrad- 
uate days at Cambridge. The **mood" is of utter 
grief over the woman beloved and lost ; and the poet 
identifies himself so closely with his own creation ** that 
the circumstances of the narration seem to have a 
natural correspondence with the predominant feeling.** 
Other ** ideal characters," which an old-fashioned 
taste can still enjoy, in spite of Blackwood* s flouts and 
jeers, are The Merman and The Mermaid, just as it 
** believes in fairies'* and in tales of the Land that is 
east of the sun and west of the moon. 

The third ** excellency '* is his power of description ; 
in Hallam's words, **his vivid, picturesque delineation 
of objects, and the peculiar skill with which he holds 
all of them fused, to borrow a metaphor from science, 
in a medium of strong emotion. ' * In this * * excellency ' * 
Tennyson shows his kinship with Wordsworth. Born 
in the Calabria of England, familiar from boyhood with 
the tall peaks that lift the eyes o^ men heavenward, 
Wordsworth, the hill-man, has a sympathy w^ith the 
great things which Tennyson, the dweller on the plain, 
rarely felt. Tennyson has no line like — 

*' The silence that is in the starry sky, 
The sleep that is among the lonely hills." 

But in their description of the small things they are 
alike in simple truth of perception and directness of 
expression. In the first verse of Mariana, Tennyson 
induces an impression of wistful beauty of the most 



xliv 31ntroDuction 

commonplace materials, — flower-beds overgrown with 
black moss, rusty nails fallen from espaliers, broken 
sheds, weedy thatch. The statement is direct and plain 
to the verge of baldness ; **The flower-pots were one 
and all thickly crusted with blackest moss." In the 
next sentence, the order is even the order of prose. 
But these commonplace things grouped as Tennyson 
groups them seem ** sad " and ** strange " and 
*' lonely ;" they stand forth in an atmosphere of gentle 
melancholy, and while the picture is haunted by the sense 
of tears, it is also haunted by the spirit of beauty. The 
** vividness " of the ** delineation " comes chiefly from 
the seer's singleness of eye. Mariana is also a good 
illustration of strong emotion pervading a poem evenly 
and guiding the selection of details each of which brings 
its own contribution to the totality of efi^ect. Tennyson 
combines the truth of Wordsworth's observation, not 
with Wordsworth's austerity, but with the sensuousness 
of Keats. He prefers, too, Hke Scott to paint with the 
object before his eyes, and not to recall it in a mood of 
contemplation. 

The fourth "excellency" is excellency of tech- 
nique. Hallam commends ** the variety of his lyrical 
measures, and exquisite modulation of harmonious 
words and cadences to the swell and fall of the feelings 
expressed." Being himself a poet, Hallam is especially 
fitted to estimate the subtle and sympathetic agreement 
between the emotion of a poem and the form of words ; 
but the ** variety of his lyrical measures " would be ap- 
parent to the most casual reader. And the ** variety " 



31ntroDuction xlv 

would be more noticeable in the first volume than now, 
when more than half the poems in it have been sup- 
pressed. From Claribel to Crossing the Bar^ Tennyson 
is consistently ** lyrical.'* His verse makes first the 
appeal of music ; it wins its way by its delicate harmony. 
Writing in 1843, another poet, Elizabeth Barrett, 
emphasizes the same ** excellency." ** Perhaps the first 
spell cast by Mr. Tennyson, the master of many spells, 
he cast upon the ear. His power as a versifier is re- 
markable. The measures flow softly or roll nobly to 
his pen ; as well one as the other. He can gather up his 
strength, like a serpent, in the silver coil of a line ; or 
dart it out straight and free. Nay, he will write you 
a poem with nothing in it except music ; and as if its 
music were everything it shall fill your soul." ^ She 
has in mind Claribel Y^\i\c\\. she quotes as a challenge 
to the Italian to match for concord of sweet sounds. 
It is not strictly true that he will write you a sentence 
with nothing in it but music ; even the content of 
Claribel is more than mere harmony ; but the sen- 
tence is prophetic of Swinburne. 

This rich variety of lyrical measures and this careful 
workmanship were new in 1830. The prevailing in- 
fluences were Byron and Scott ; and in their work, the 
chief interest was the interest of narrative. Their poetry 
is epic, not lyrical. Both exalted carelessness to the 
rank of a virtue and in practice erected it into a svstem.^ 
The reason is obvious. Both were romantic reactionaries 

* Literary Anecdotes of the Nineteenth Century y i. 38 f. 
' See the poetical epistles in Marmion. 



xlvi ^Introduction 

against the classical school of Pope. Their ideal was 
the ballad, a free, sincere, spontaneous product of na- 
ture. To linger over details, to carve and prune, and 
alter and polish seemed antagonistic to their theory of 
poetic inspiration. Shelley was hasty by temperament, 
rushing his poems to the printer as soon as the ink of 
the manuscript was dry ; often the first verse of his lyr- 
ics is the best. In Keats' s earliest work, too, a want of 
finish is apparent ; often in Endymioriy the rhymes seem 
to call forth the ideas, not the ideas, the rhymes. 
Tennyson's mission was to show how strong and gen- 
uine emotion could not only co-exist with careful work- 
manship but furnish its motive power. 

Hallam's fifth point touches one great source of 
Tennyson's power, **the elevated habits of thought, 
implied in these compositions." He was not perhaps 
a great thinker, certainly not a great original thinker ; 
his brain was not so active and athletic as Brown- 
ing's : but he habitually lives and moves and has his 
being on the high table-lands of thought and emotion. 
This is apparent even in his correspondence with his 
college friends. Tennyson's was a deeply religious na- 
ture ; he took life and the world and himself and his 
art all seriously. Moore is Tennyson's contemporary : 
he has for theme a betrayed and mournful country, but 
through his lyric there sounds the tinkle of the drawing- 
room piano. He cannot manage to make the extinc- 
tion of Ireland's hopes as impressive as Tennyson 
makes the death of the swan. All the romantic lead- 
ers, Scott, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, 



3|ntroDuction xlvii 

even Byron in spite of Don Juaity break definitely with 
the eighteenth century in their treatment of all the 
problems of sex. In all the general tone is deeper, 
more serious, more earnest. Tennyson's poetic creed 
expressed in the proem to The Palace of Art consists 
of one article, Beauty, Truth, and Goodness are 
three sisters and never can be sundered without tears. 
The Memoir shows how consistently he lived in that 
creed. 

If the poems of 1830 and 1832 be considered to- 
gether, it will be seen that Tennyson combines an ap- 
preciation of the true romantic and the true classic such 
as is previously found only in Keats. La Belle Dame 
Sans Merci, the most beautiful English version of the 
Venusberg mythus, shows how the imagination of Keats 
seized on the passion, the mystery, the childish illusion 
of the Middle Ages and made them its own. Hyperion 
and the Grecian Urn demonstrate Keats' s instinctive 
Hellenism. The Lady of Shallott, Tennyson's first 
essay in the region of Arthurian romance, indicates his 
sympathetic understanding of the medieval temper and 
feeling, while (Enone is thoroughly classic in its theme, 
its stateliness, its clear light and its freedom from mys- 
tery. In both worlds, he moves with greater freedom 
and a more assured step than Keats. If not so mani- 
festly inspired, his treatment of both classical and ro- 
mantic themes is more learned and more finished. 

However it arose, the kinship of Tennyson with 
Keats is unmistakable. In his power of imagination. 



xiviii ^Introduction 

his power of description, his power of technique, he 
comes perhaps closest to the elder poet. His sym- 
pathy with alien moods of character which Hallam 
was subtle enough to detect so early, and his elevated 
habits of thought are more peculiarly his own. The 
combination of ** excellencies" gave distinction to the 
new poet and justified the bold statement of his college 
friend, ** The author imitates nobody." 

IV 

The popularity of an author is of course no criterion 
of merit. Matthew Arnold was unpopular, while forty 
editions of Martin Farquhar Tupper were eagerly de- 
voured by an admiring public. Popularity may be the 
stamp of inferiority. Every generation has its widely 
read, immortal novelist, who is speedily forgotten by 
the next. Mr. Hall Caine and Miss Marie Corclli 
command audiences today which are denied to Mere- 
dith and Hardy. It may be doubted whether the 
master-pieces of Hawthorne ever were able to compete 
in point of sales with the novels of **a person named 
Roe." Popularity may be immediate and well de- 
served, as in the case of Scott, Byron and Dickens, 
because there is in them an appeal to those passions 
that are universal in all men ; or it may be slow 
and gradual, as in the case of Wordsworth and Tenny- 
son. Few will quarrel with Ruskin's account of how 
reputation comes to all that is highest in art and litera- 
ture. "It is an insult to what is really great in either 
to suppose that it in any way addresses itself to mean 



3f|ntroDuctiDn xiix 

or uncultivated faculties." The question what is really 
high in art is not decided by the multitude, \m\.for the 
multitude, — ** decided at first by a few ; by fewer as 
the merits of a work are of a higher order. From 
these few the decision is communicated to the number 
next below them in rank of mind, and by these again to 
a wider and lower circle ; each rank being so far cog- 
nizant of the superiority of that above it, as to receive 
its decision with respect ; until, in process of time, the 
right and consistent opinion is communicated to all, and 
held by all as a matter of faith, the more positively in 
proportion as the grounds of it are less perceived.** 
This explanation certainly applies to Tennyson. At 
first he was discouraged by the unsympathetic recep- 
tion of his works, the ridicule of the ^arterly and 
Blackwoody and ** half resolved to live abroad in Jersey, 
in the south of France, or Italy. He was so far per- 
suaded that the English people would never care for 
his poetry, that, had it not been for the intervention of 
his friends, he declared it not unlikely that, after the 
death of Hallam, he would not have continued to 
write." 1 He was, however, a man ** of long enduring 
hopes ;" he was able to wait, and fame came to him 
at last. 

The undoubted fact of Tennyson's long continued 
popularity is rather strange. There are reasons why 
his poetry should not be popular. Scott and Byron 
were popular because they had a story to tell and told 
it with vigor and spirit : but Tennyson has little or 
no epic interest, especially in his earliest work : the 

^ Memoir, I, 97. 



1 31ntroDuction 

interest is lyric and therefore less wide in its appeal. 
Again, he does not relate himself to common life as 
Wordsworth does ; nor does he, like Shelley, espouse 
the people's cause. His attitude is that of the intel- 
lectual aristocrat, aloof, fastidious, dignified. He is 
essentially a local and an English poet. Some of his 
most thoroughly characteristic lines are, 

*' The noblest men methinks are bred 
Of ours the Saxo-Norman race." 

Germany, Italy, the United States do not exist in 
his verse. He evinces no sympathy with the great 
struggles of these nationalities towards the assertion of 
their natural rights, even for the right to exist. The 
Great Republic is rent asunder by four years of terrific 
conflict, and Tennyson has no word of cheer for 
either side. But democratic America welcomed and 
read his poems with as much enthusiasm as his own 
countrymen. 

Why, in spite of these apparent drawbacks, Tenny- 
son was and has remained, and, no doubt will long re- 
main, popular, is now to be considered. A definition 
of poetry that finds universal acceptance is still to seek. 
It may be ** a criticism of life," or, ** the suggestion by 
the imagination of noble grounds for the noble emo- 
tions," or any other one of the hundred that the wit 
of man has fi-amed : but, whatever it includes or omits, 
poetry must possess two things — beauty and harmony. 
Beauty and harmony, harmony and beauty — these 
are the two principles without which poetry cannot 
exist ; these are the pillars of the poets' universe. 



31ntroOuction li 

Poetry, to be poetry, must possess harmony and beauty; 
and harmony and beauty inform the poetry of Tenny- 
son and are the law of its being. 

Literature and poetry, especially lyric poetry, have the 
most ancient associations with music; and the further 
poetry strays from music, the less poetic it becomes. 
Many poets have failed or come short because they 
failed to understand this basal principle, or else deliber- 
ately departed from it. Wordsworth was in feeling a 
rustic, near the ground, in close touch with husbandman 
and shepherd, but his verse is repressed and austere and 
his range is hmited . He is not read by workmen as Burns 
is read. Carducci calls himself a plebeian, but he is an 
aristocrat when he writes Odi Barbare^ which only 
the few can understand and delight in. Whitman, who 
made democracy a religion, and proved his faith by his 
works in the Washington hospitals, chanted his swing- 
ing pasans of democracy for the benefit of a group of 
London decadents and scanty coteries of illuminati in 
Boston and New York. They failed, but Tennyson 
succeeded, because, following the bent of his genius, 
he set himself humbly to obey eternal and unchang- 
ing law, for the principle of beauty inheres as firmly 
in the universe as the law of gravitation. Nobility 
of thought, beauty of vision, harmony of word and 
phrase and stanza, just proportion in the whole, — at 
these Tennyson aims, and to these he succeeds in at- 
taining. His first appeal is to the ear ; his verse wins 
its way as music does, the most democratic of all the 
fine arts, and the most masterful in its power to stir 
the human heart. The poet's limitations, his narrow 



Hi 3IntroDuction 

outlook, his imperfect sympathies matter not. Music 
speaks a universal language ; and the poetry that 
comes nearest to music is surest to reach the wid- 
est audience. Ian Maclaren's story of the Scottish 
peasant who knew her In Memoriam by heart is 
no mere fancy. No more beautiful illustration . of the 
power of literature to soothe and cheer is to be found 
anywhere than the anecdote Mrs. Gaskell tells in the 
first volume of that treasure-house of noble thoughts, 
the Memoir. ** Samuel Bamford is a great, gaunt, 
stalwart Lancashire man, formerly hand-loom weaver, 
author of Life of a Radical y age nearly 70, and living 
in that state that is exactly decent poverty with his 
neat little apple-faced wife. They have lost their only 
child. Bamford is the most hearty (and it's saying a 
good deal) admirer of Tennyson I know. You know 
I dislike recitations exceedingly, but he repeats some 
of Tennyson's poems in so rapt and yet so simple a 
manner, utterly forgetting that anyone is by, in the de- 
light of the music and the exquisite thoughts, that one 
can't help liking to hear him. He does not care one 
jot whether people like him or not in his own intense 
enjoyment. He says when he lies awake at night, as 
in his old age he often does, and gets sadly thinking of 
the days that are gone when his child was alive, he 
soothes himself by repeating Tennyson's poems." It 
would seem that poetry can be an anodyne for old 
age, sad thoughts, bereavement. The childless father 
soothes himself by repeating Tennyson's poems. ** He 
does not care whether people like him or not in his 
own intense enjoyment." Samuel Bamford, old hand- 



3(Introliuction liii 

loom weaver, makes Plato's statement credible, that the 
rhapsodists reciting Homer fell down fainting in their 
ecstasies. 

Though subject to certain inevitable fluctuations, 
Tennyson's fame was great and constant. He retained 
the praise of the judicious, while he won the suffrages 
of the multitude. The greatest and wisest and best of 
two generations came under his spell. Few poets have 
been more heartily acclaimed by fellow poets. Brown- 
ing's dedication of his own selected poems is typical of 
the general esteem — 

TO ALFRED TENNYSON, 

IN POETRY, ILLUSTRIOUS AND CONSUMMATE, 

IN FRIENDSHIP, NOBLE AND SINCERE. 

In his majestic old age, he became an object of vener- 
ation. Merlin the seer. Tennyson was an imperialist, 
that is, an Englishman impressed with the value of the 
new nations, the dominions over seas, and the necessity 
of keeping the empire one. In the last year of his life, 
he came into touch with the imperialist poet of the 
new school. He praised, too, Mr. Rudyard Kipling's 
'English Flag,' and Kipling's answer to his letter of 
commendation gave him pleasure: **When the private 
in the ranks is praised by the general, he cannot pre- 
sume to thank him, but he fights the better the next 
day. " A list of those who have praised his work would 
include the best minds on both sides of the Atlantic. 
Longfellow spoke for America in the Christmas sonnet, 
which he wrote and sent in 1877 



liv 3IntroUuction 

" in sign 
Of homage to the mastery which is thine 
In English song, — ' ' 

But Tennyson impressed the English speaking world of 
his time not alone directly by the impact of his poetry 
on the leaders of thought, he exerted a great secondary 
influence through his hosts of imitators. The parallel 
between Tennyson and Pope has been sometimes drawn, 
and not unwisely. Both set before them very definite 
ideals of technique. Pope's ** was correctness;" Tenny- 
son's was brevity, just proportion and finish. Their 
aims have very much in common. Each would under- 
stand the other when he spoke 

" Of charm, and lucid order and the labour of the file." 

Both became supreme verbal artists, and verbal artistry 
is no slight thing. To think of either Pope or Tenny- 
son merely as artificers of word mosaics, as cunning 
jewelers of phrases is to wrong them. Their search 
for the exact word was really a search for the idea. 
Both are poets' poets, in the sense that their literary 
influence is supreme in their centuries. Both set the 
tune for their age. The manner of Pope prevailed in 
the eighteenth century and the manner of Tennyson 
prevailed in the nineteenth. Arnold, William Morris, 
Rossetti would have written in another way except for 
Tennyson. Swinburne, the greatest of them all, simply 
carries Tennyson's mastery of words one stage further, 
and represents, perhaps, the utmost possibilities in sweet- 
ening the English tongue. The recognition of Tenny- 
son' s influence upon the minor verse of the last half 



31ntroliuction iv 

century has long been a commonplace of the re- 
viewer. 

It was through no condescension to the taste of the 
groundlings, that Tennyson won his popularity. He 
takes high ground and he calls us up to it. Although 
first and foremost an artist, he did not rest in a worship 
of beauty. He would not agree with Keats that Beauty 
is Truth and Truth is Beauty, that this is all we know 
on earth and all we need to know. He left the maxim 
**Art for Art's sake" to be invented by his followers. 
He knew, even as a youth at college, that the nature 
of man cannot wholly take refuge in Art. He knew that 
other things must have their share. His own avowed 
theory of his art is that 

'* Beauty, Good and Knowledge are three sisters 
That dote upon each other — 
And never can be sunder' d without tears." 

Tennyson's was essendally a reverent, a religious 
nature. His tendency to brood on the riddle of the 
painful earth is seen clearly even in his earliest poems ; 
and is thoroughly in accord with the strong religious 
fibre of the English people. It was an English natural- 
ist who, in the mid-nineteenth century, turned the cur- 
rent of the world's thought. Darwin and his theory 
of evolution gave a new impetus and direction to the 
conceptions of man, life and the universe. One imme- 
diate result was the shattering of old beliefs. No one felt 
the conflict between the old faith and the new know- 
ledge more keenly than Tennyson, and no one has 
represented that conflict more powerfully than he has 
in In Memoriam. Though often cast down in the strug- 



ivi 3|ntroDuction 

gle, faith emerges victorious. Along with Ruskin and 
Carlyle, Tennyson has helped to shape for English 
people some sort of via media between science and re- 
ligion. In this love of beauty united with deep moral 
earnestness, Tennyson is akin to young Milton who 
sang the praise of purity in ComuSy and Spenser who 
intended by the Fairy Queen to fashion a gentleman or 
noble person in virtuous and gentle discipline. 

** And your experience has made you sad," Rosa- 
lind might say to Tennyson as to the melancholy Jaques. 
He is often hastily described as a pessimist and he cer- 
tainly chose a mournful muse. His great poem is an 
elegy, an inscription on a tomb, a resolute facing of the 
great issues raised by the death of his friend. Without 
being morbid, he is impressed with the tragedy of life 
and the fact of death. Even in the Poems by Two Broth- 
ers he is at times sad as night. Orianay The Lady of 
Shalotty Maudy Aylmer^ s Fieldy Enoch Ardeny The 
Idylls of the Kingy are all tragic. Disappointed love is 
the theme of Locksley Hally the two Marianasy Dora, 
Love and Dutyy to mention only a few of his earlier 
poems. The beauty of the form makes us forget the 
eternal note of sadness in them all. Tennyson's sadness 
is the melancholy of the North, which is quite com- 
patible with a gift of humor. His humor is deep and 
rich, if rather quiet as in the Northern Farmers y and is 
a development of later life. He speaks of his college 
days as those ** dawn golden times," and his first two 
volumes do reflect the splendor of the sunrise : but 
though afterwards he can write fanciful medley like 
The PrincesSy or the graceful fairy-tale like The Day 



31ntroDuction ivii 

Dreamy the first vision has passed away forever. To 
realize the general sadness of tone in Tennyson, a short 
dip into Brow^ning is necessary, some brief contact with 
his high spirits, his unbounded cheerfulness, his robust 
assertion that God 's in His Heaven. 

The nineteenth century is now definitely behind us, 
a closed chapter in the history of human progress. It 
is too soon to define it, as we can define the eighteenth 
century ; for we feel ourselves part of it still. But 
certain features stand out prominently. It is the age of 
industrial and commercial expansion, of natural science, 
of democracy, of the rise and consolidation of nation- 
alities. The settlement of the planet, the exploitation 
of its natural resources have gone on with feverish haste. 
Steam transportation has shifted vast masses of popula- 
tion from the country to the cities and from the old 
world to the new. It was a practical, commercial, 
industrial age, and yet it was an age of poets. Never 
before did poets wield such an influence, because never 
before were so many people able to read, and never 
before were national fi-ontiers so lightly over-stepped by 
books. Scott, Byron, Wordsworth did in a very real 
sense sway the hearts and minds of men. Byron's in- 
fluence in particular extended far beyond his native land; 
his poetry was a genuine call to freedom, an inspiration 
to all noble conspirators all over Europe ; and its power 
is by no means exhausted yet. The influence of Ten- 
nyson has been more restricted to that great section of 
the human race whose mother tongue is English. For 
two generations he was their favorite poet. He was 
undoubtedly the poet of his age, and the fact of hi$ 



iviii JlntroDuction 

popularity is flattering to the age. Appreciation means 
sympathy. As Tennyson was widely read and enthu- 
siastically admired by all classes of minds in his time, 
he is in a way the mirror of his century. Hence it is 
not an unfair inference that very many men and women, 
his contemporaries, were sensitive to beauty in all its 
forms, possessed broad culture and thorough refinement, 
lived on the moral uplands, and envisaged with earnest- 
ness the tremendous riddles of human life and destiny. 
For poetry is not an amusement, a recreation. It is 
truly a ** criticism of life." We turn to our poets in- 
stinctively for guidance in matters of faith. Not in vain 
do we come to Tennyson. He may not offer a very 
certain hope, but he does 

"Teach high faith and honourable words 
And courtliness and the desire of fame 
And love of truth — . ' ' 



Select i^oemjs of Cenn^jSon 



POEMS, CHIEFLY LYRICAL, 1830 
CLARIBEL 

A MELODY 
I 

Where Claribel low-lieth 
The breezes pause and die, 
Letting the rose-leaves fall : 
But the solemn oak-tree sigheth, 

Thick-leaved, ambrosial, 5 

With an ancient melody 
Of an inward agony, 
Where Claribel low-lieth. 

II 
At eve the beetle boometh 

Athwart the thicket lone : 10 

At noon the wild bee hummeth 

About the moss'd headstone : 
At midnight the moon cometh. 

And looketh down alone. 



&t\tct poem0 of arenn^fifon 

Her song the lintwhite swelleth, 15 

The clear-voiced mavis dwelleth, 

The callow throstle lispeth, 
The slumbrous wave outwelleth 

The babbling runnel crispeth, 
The hollow grot replieth 20 

Where Clahbel low-lieth. 



MARIANA 

' Mariana in the moated grange.* 

Measure for Measure. 

With blackest moss the flower-plots 
Were thickly crusted, one and all : 
The rusted nails fell from the knots 

That held the pear to the gable-wall. 
The broken sheds look'd sad and strange : 5 
Unlifted was the clinking latch ; 
Weeded and worn the ancient thatch 
Upon the lonely moated grange, 

She only said, ' My life is dreary, 

He Cometh not,' she said ; i© 

She said, 'I am aweary, aweary, 
I would that I were dead ! ' 

Her tears fell with the dews at even ; 
Her tears fell ere the dews were dried ; 



^pariana 3 

She could not look on the sweet heaven, 15 

Either at morn or eventide. 
After the flitting of the bats, 

When thickest dark did trance the sky. 
She drew her casement-curtain by. 
And glanced athwart the glooming flats. 20 

She only said, ' The night is dreary, 

He Cometh not,' she said ; 

She said, ' I am aweary, aweary, 

I would that I were dead ! ' 

Upon the middle of the night, ^5 

Waking she heard the night-fowl crow : 
The cock sung out an hour ere light : 
From the dark fen the oxen's low 
Came to her : without hope of change. 

In sleep she seem'd to walk forlorn, 3° 

Till cold winds woke the gray-eyed morn 
About the lonely moated grange. 

She only said, ' The day is dreary. 

He Cometh not,' she said ; 
She said, ' I am aweary, aweary, 35 

I would that I were dead ! ' 

About a stone-cast from the wall 

A sluice with blacken'd waters slept. 

And o'er it many, round and small. 

The cluster'd marish-mosses crept. 40 



^tittt poem0 of (E^mn^flfon 

Hard by a poplar shook alway, 

All silver-green with gnarled bark : 
For leagues no other tree did mark 
The level waste, the rounding gray. 

She only said, ' My life is dreary, 45 

He Cometh not,' she said ; 

She said, ' I am aweary, aweary, 

I would that I were dead ! * 



And ever when the moon was low. 

And the shrill winds were up and away, 50 
In the white curtain, to and fro. 

She saw the gusty shadow sway. 
But when the moon was very low. 

And wild winds bound within their cell, 
The shadow of the poplar fell 55 

Upon her bed, across her brow. 

She only said, ' The night is dreary. 

He Cometh not,' she said ; 
She said, ' I am aweary, aweary, 

I would that I were dead ! ' 60 



All day within the dreamy house. 

The doors upon their hinges creak'd; 

The blue fly sung in the pane ; the mouse 
Behind the mouldering wainscot shriek'd, 



KecoUectionflf of tlje Sirabian 0^^ 5 

Or from the crevice peered about. 6- 

Old faces glimmer'd thro' the doors 
Old footsteps trod the upper floors, 
Old voices called her from without 
She only said, ' My life is dreary. 

He Cometh not,' she said ; 70 

She said, ' I am aw^eary, aweary, 
I would that I were dead ! ' 

The sparrow's chirrup on the roof. 

The slow clock ticking, and the sound 
Which to the wooing wind aloof 75 

The poplar made, did all confound 
Her sense ; but most she loathed the hour 
When the thick-moted sunbeam lay 
Athwart the chambers, and the day 
Was sloping toward his western bower. 80 

Then said she, ' I am very dreary, 

He will not come,' she said ; 

She wept, ' I am aweary, aweary. 

Oh God, that I were dead ! ' 



RECOLLECTIONS OF THE 
ARABIAN NIGHTS 

When the breeze of a joyful dawn blew free 
In the silken sail of infancy. 



g)elf ct ^otm& of ®mn^0on 

The tide of time flow'd back with me, 
The forward-flowing tide of time ; 

And many a sheeny summer-morn, 5 

Adown the Tigris I was borne, 

By Bagdat's shrines of fretted gold. 

High-walled gardens green and old ; 

True Mussulman was I and sworn. 

For it was in the golden prime 10 

Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Anight my shallop, rustling thro' 

The low and bloomed foliage, drove 

The fragrant, glistening deeps, and clove 

The citron-shadows in the blue : 15 

By garden porches on the brim. 

The costly doors flung open wide. 

Gold glittering thro' lamplight dim. 

And broider'd sofas on each side : 

In sooth it was a goodly time, ao 

For it was in the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Often, where clear-stemm'd platans guard 

The outlet, did I turn away 

The boat-head down a broad canal 15 

From the main river sluiced, where all 

The sloping of the moon-lit sward 

Was damask-work, and deep inlay 



KecoUrctionfli of ttje 3lrabian 0qf)tii 7 

Of braided blooms unmown, which crept 
Adown to where the water slept. 30 

A goodly place, a goodly time, 

For it was in the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

A motion from the river won 

Ridged the smooth level, bearing on 35 

My shallop thro' the star-strown calm, 

Until another night in night 

I enter'd, from the clearer light, 

Imbower'd vaults of pillar'd palm, 

Imprisoning sweets, which, as they clomb 40 

Heavenward, were stay'd beneath the dome 

Of hollow boughs. — A goodly time. 

For it was in the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Still onward ; and the clear canal 45 

Is rounded to as clear a lake. 

From the green rivage many a fall 

Of diamond rillets musical. 

Thro' little crystal arches low 

Down from the central fountain's flow 50 

Fall'n silver-chiming, seemed to shake 

The sparkling flints beneath the prow. 

A goodly place, a goodly time. 

For it was in the golden prime 

Of good Haroun Alraschid. 55 



8 Select l^onns of ®mn^0on 

Above thro' many a bowery turn 
A walk with vary-colour'd shells 
Wander'd engrain'd. On either side 
All round about the fragrant marge 
From fluted vase, and brazen urn 60 

In order, eastern flowers large, 
Some dropping low their crimson bells 
Half-closed, and others studded wide 
With disks and tiars, fed the time 
With odour in the golden prime 65 

Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Far ofi\, and where the lemon grove 

In closest coverture upsprung. 

The living airs of middle night 

Died round the bulbul as he sung ; 70 

Not he : but something which possess'd 

The darkness of the world, delight. 

Life, anguish, death, immortal love. 

Ceasing not, mingled, unrepress'd. 

Apart from place, withholding time, 75 

But flattering the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Black the garden-bowers and grots 
Slumber'd : the solemn palms were ranged 
Above, unwoo'd of summer wind : g© 

A sudden splendour from behind 



Mecollectionfif of t^t 3irabian iliigtjtflf 9 

Flush'd all the leaves with rich gold-green, 

And, flowing rapidly between 

Their interspaces, counterchanged 

The level lake with diamond-plots 85 

Of dark and bright. A lovely time. 

For it was in the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Dark-blue the deep sphere overhead. 

Distinct with vivid stars inlaid, 90 

Grew darker from that under-flame : 

So, leaping lightly from the boat. 

With silver anchor left afloat, 

In marvel whence that glory came 

Upon me, as in sleep I sank 95 

In cool soft turf upon the bank. 

Entranced with that place and time, 

So worthy of the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Thence thro' the garden I was drawn — 100 

A realm of pleasance, many a mound. 

And many a shadow-chequer'd lawn 

Full of the city's stilly sound. 

And deep myrrh-thickets blowing round 

The stately cedar, tamarisks, 105 

Thick rosaries of scented thorn. 

Tall orient shrubs, and obelisks 



lo s>elect ponn0 of tETenn^^on 

Graven with emblems of the time, 
In honour of the golden prime 

Of good Haroun Alraschid. loo 

With dazed vision unawares 

From the long alley's latticed shade 

Emerged I came upon the great 

Pavilion of the Caliphat. 

Right to the carven cedarn doors, 115 

Flung inward over spangled floors. 

Broad-based flights of marble stairs 

Ran up with golden balustrade, 

After the fashion of the time, 

And humour of the golden prime no 

Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

The fourscore windows all alight 

As with the quintessence of flame, 

A million tapers flaring bright 

From twisted silvers look'd to shame 125 

The hollow-vaulted dark, and streamed 

Upon the mooned domes aloof 

In inmost Bagdat, till there seem'd 

Hundreds of crescents on the roof 

Of night new-risen, that marvellous time 130 

To celebrate the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Then stole I up, and trancedly 
Gazed on the Persian girl alone. 



Serene with argent-lidded eyes '35 

Amorous, and lashes like to rays 

Of darkness, and a brow of pearl 

Tressed with redolent ebony. 

In many a dark delicious curl. 

Flowing beneath her rose-hued zone ; 140 

The sweetest lady of the time. 

Well worthy of the golden prime 
Of good Haroun Alraschid. 

Six columns, three on either side, 

Pure silver, underpropt a rich 145 

Throne of the massive ore, from which 

Down-droop'd, in many a floating fold, 

Engarlanded and diaper'd 

With inwrought flowers, a cloth of gold. 

Thereon, his deep eye laughter-stirr'd 150 

With merriment of kingly pride. 
Sole star of all that place and time, 
I saw him — in his golden prime. 
The Good Haroun Alraschid. 



THE DYING SWAN 



The plain was grassy, wild and bare, 
Wide, wild, and open to the air. 



12 Select pormsi of ^mn^^on 

Which had built up everywhere 

An under-roof of doleful gray. 
With an inner voice the river ran, 5 

Adown it floated a dying swan, 
And loudly did lament. 
It was the middle of the day. 
Ever the weary wind went on. 

And took the reed-tops as it went. 10 

II 
Some blue peaks in the distance rose. 
And white against the cold-white sky. 
Shone out their crowning snows. 

One willow over the river wept, 
And shook the wave as the wind did sigh ; 15 
Above in the wind was the swallow. 
Chasing itself at its own wild will, 
And far thro' the marish green and still 

The tangled water-courses slept. 
Shot over with purple, and green, and yellow. 10 

III 
The wild swan's death-hymn took the soul 
Of that waste place with joy 
Hidden in sorrow : at first to the ear 
The warble was low, and full and clear ; 
And floating about the under-sky, 15 

Prevailing in weakness, the coronach stole ; 
Sometimes afar, and sometimes anear, 



3Pl^e SD^ing g)ljDan 13 

But anon her awful, jubilant voice, 

With a music strange and manifold, 

Flow'd forth on a carol free and bold ; 3° 

As when a mighty people rejoice, 

With shawms, and with cymbals, and harps of 

gold. 
And the tumult of their acclaim is roll'd 
Thro' the open gates of the city afar. 
To the shepherd who watcheth the evening star. 35 
And the creeping mosses and clambering weeds, 
And the willow-branches hoar and dank. 
And the wavy swell of the soughing reeds. 
And the wave-worn horns of the echoing bank. 
And the silvery marish-flowers that throng 40 

The desolate creeks and pools among. 
Were flooded over with eddying song. 



POEMS. 1833 



THE LADY OF SHALOTT 

PART I 

On either side the river lie 
Long fields of barley and of rye, 
That clothe the wold and meet the sky; 
And thro' the field the road runs by 

To many-tower'd Camelot j 5 

And up and down the people go, 
Gazing where the lilies blow 
Round an island there below. 

The island of Shalott. 

Willows whiten, aspens quiver, 10 

Little breezes dusk and shiver 
Thro' the wave that runs for ever 
By the island in the river 

Flowing down to Camelot. 
Four gray walls, and four gray towers, 15 
Overlook a space of flowers. 
And the silent isle imbowers 

The Lady of Shalott. 



tE^tje MD^ of ^lialott 15 

By the margin, willow-veil'd, 

Slide the heavy barges trail'd ao 

By slow horses ; and unhail'd 

The shallop flitteth silken-sailM 

Skimming down to Camelot : 
But who hath seen her wave her hand ? 
Or at the casement seen her stand ? 25 

Or is she known in all the land, 

The Lady of Shalott ? 

Only reapers, reaping early 

In among the bearded barley. 

Hear a song that echoes cheerly 30 

From the river winding clearly, 

Down to tower'd Camelot : 
And by the moon the reaper weary, 
Piling sheaves in uplands airy. 
Listening, whispers ' *T is the fairy 35 

Lady of Shalott/ 



PART II 

There she weaves by night and day 
A magic web with colours gay. 
She has heard a whisper say, 
A curse is on her if she stay ^ 

To look down to Camelot. 



1 6 g)elect potmiS of (Krnn^^on 

She knows not what the curse may be, 
And so she weaveth steadily, 
And little other care hath she, 

The Lady of Shalott. 45 

And moving thro' a mirror clear 
That hangs before her all the year. 
Shadows of the world appear. 
There she sees the highway near 

Winding down to Camelot : 50 

There the river eddy whirls, 
And there the surly village-churls, 
And the red cloaks of market girls. 

Pass onward from Shalott. 

Sometimes a troop of damsels glad, 55 

An abbot on an ambling pad. 
Sometimes a curly shepherd-lad. 
Or long-hairM page in crimson clad. 

Goes by to tower'd Camelot ; 
And sometimes thro' the mirror blue 60 

The knights come riding two and two : 
She hath no loyal knight and true, 

The Lady of Shalott. 

But in her web she still delights 

To weave the mirror's magic sights, 65 

For often thro' the silent nights 

A funeral, with plumes and lights 

And music, went to Camelot : 



tETtie ilau^ of ^lialott 17 

Or when the moon was overhead, 
Came two young lovers lately wed : y© 

* I am half sick of shadows,' said 
The Lady of Shalott. 



PART III 

A BOW-SHOT from her bower-eaves, 

He rode between the barley-sheaves. 

The sun came dazzling thro' the leaves, 75 

And flamed upon the brazen greaves 

Of bold Sir Lancelot. 
A red-cross knight for ever kneelM 
To a lady in his shield. 
That sparkled on the yellow field, 80 

Beside remote Shalott. 

The gemmy bridle glitter'd free. 

Like to some branch of stars we see 

Hung in the golden Galaxy. 

The bridle bells rang merrily 85 

As he rode down to Camelot : 
And from his blazon'd baldric slung 
A mighty silver bugle hung, 
And as he rode his armour rung. 

Beside remote Shalott. 90 



1 8 Select pprm0 of tlPmn^jfon 

All in the blue unclouded weather 
Thick-jeweird shone the saddle-leather, 
The helmet and the helmet-feather 
Burn'd like one burning flame together. 

As he rode down to Camelot. 95 

As often thro* the purple night. 
Below the starry clusters bright. 
Some bearded meteor, trailing light. 

Moves over still Shalott. 

His broad clear brow in sunlight glow'd ; loo 
On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode ; 
From underneath his helmet flowM 
His coal-black curls as on he rode, 

As he rode down to Camelot. 
From the bank and from the river 105 

He flash'd into the crystal mirror, 
' Tirra lirra,' by the river 

Sang Sir Lancelot. 

She left the web, she left the loom. 

She made three paces thro' the room, no 

She saw the water-lily bloom, 

She saw the helmet and the plume. 

She looked down to Camelot. 
Out flew the web and floated wide ; 
The mirror crack'd from side to side; 115 

*The curse is come upon me,* cried 

The Lady of Shalott. 



tE^\)t llaD^ of S^tialotc 19 



PART IV 



In the stormy east-wind straining, 
The pale yellow woods were waning, 
The broad stream in his banks complaining, 120 
Heavily the low sky raining 

Over tower'd Camelot ; 
Down she came and found a boat 
Beneath a willow left afloat. 
And round about the prow she wrote 125 

The Lady of Shalott, 

And down the river's dim expanse 

Like some bold seer in a trance, 

Seeing all his own mischance — 

With a glassy countenance 130 

Did she look to Camelot. 
And at the closing of the day 
She loosed the chain, and down she lay ; 
The broad stream bore her far away, 

The Lady of Shalott. 135 

Lying, robed in snowy white 
That loosely flew to left and right — 
The leaves upon her falling light — 
Thro* the noises of the night 

She floated down to Camelot : 140 



20 g>elect J^oem0 of tETenn^flfon 

And as the boat-head wound along 
The willowy hills and fields among, 
They heard her singing her last song, 
The Lady of Shalott. 

Heard a carol, mournful, holy, 145 

Chanted loudly, chanted lowly. 
Till her blood was frozen slowly. 
And her eyes were darken'd wholly, 

Turn'd to tower'd Camelot. 
For ere she reach'd upon the tide 150 

The first house by the water-side. 
Singing in her song she died. 

The Lady of Shalott. 

Under tower and balcony. 
By garden-wall and gallery, 155 

A gleaming shape she floated by. 
Dead-pale between the houses high. 

Silent into Camelot. 
Out upon the wharfs they came. 
Knight and burgher, lord and dame, 160 

And round the prow they read her name. 

The Lady of Shalott. 

Who is this ? and what is here ? 
And in the lighted palace near 
Died the sound of royal cheer ; 165 

And they cross'd themselves for fear, 
All the knights at Camelot. 



But Lancelot mused a little space ; 
He said, ' She has a lovely face ; 
God in his mercy lend her grace, 170 

The Lady of Shalott.' 



CENONE 

There lies a vale in Ida, lovelier 

Than all the valleys of Ionian hills. 

The swimming vapour slopes athwart the glen, 

Puts forth an arm, and creeps from pine to pine. 

And loiters, slowly drawn. On either hand 5 

The lawns and meadow-ledges midway down 

Hang rich in flowers, and far below them roars 

The long brook falling thro' the clov'n ravine 

In cataract after cataract to the sea. 

Behind the valley topmost Gargarus 10 

Stands up and takes the morning : but in front 

The gorges, opening wide apart, reveal 

Troas and Ilion's column'd citadel. 

The crown of Troas. 

Hither came at noon 
Mournful CEnone, wandering forlorn 15 

Of Paris, once her playmate on the hills. 
Her cheek had lost the rose, and round her neck 
Floated her hair or seem'd to float in rest. 
She, leaning on a fragment twined with vine, 



22 Select JDoentfif of ttTenn^flfon 

Sang to the stillness, till the mountain-shade i© 
Sloped downward to her seat from the upper 
cliff. 

' O mother Ida, many-fountainM Ida, 
Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
For now the noonday quiet holds the hill : 
The grasshopper is silent in the grass : 25 

The lizard, with his shadow on the stone, 
Rests like a shadow, and the winds are dead. 
The purple flower droops : the golden bee 
Is lily-cradled : I alone awake. 
My eyes are full of tears, my heart of love, 30 

My heart is breaking, and my eyes are dim. 
And I am all aweary of my life. 

' O mother Ida, many-fountain'd Ida, 
Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Hear me, O Earth, hear me, O Hills, O Caves 35 
That house the cold crown'd snake ! O moun- 
tain brooks, 
I am the daughter of a River-God, 
Hear me, for I will speak, and build up all 
My sorrow with my song, as yonder walls 
Rose slowly to a music slowly breathed, 40 

A cloud that gather'd shape : for it may be 
That, while I speak of it, a little while 
My heart may wander from its deeper woe. 



(^mont 23 

'O mother Ida, many-fountain'd Ida, 
Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 45 

I waited underneath the dawning hills. 
Aloft the mountain lawn was dewy-dark, 
And dewy dark aloft the mountain pine : 
Beautiful Paris, evil-hearted Paris, 
Leading a jet-black goat white-horn'd, white- 50 

hooved. 
Came up from reedy Simois all alone. 

' O mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Far-off the torrent callM me from the cleft : 
Far up the solitary morning smote 
The streaks of virgin snow. With down-dropt 

eyes 55 

I sat alone : white-breasted like a star 
Fronting the dawn he moved ; a leopard skin 
Droop'd from his shoulder, but his sunny hair 
Clustered about his temples like a God's : 
And his cheek brighten'd as the foam-bow 

brightens 60 

When the wind blows the foam, and all my 

heart 
Went forth to embrace him coming ere he 

came. 

* Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
He smiled, and opening out his milk-white palm 



24 Select ^otm& of ®mn^0on 

Disclosed a fruit of pure Hesperian gold, 65 

That smelt ambrosially, and while I look'd 
And listen'd, the full-flowing river of speech 
Came down upon my heart. 

" My own CEnone, 
Beautiful brow'd CEnone, my own soul, 
Behold this fruit, whose gleaming rind en- 
graven 70 
' For the most fair,* would seem to award it thine 
As lovelier than whatever Oread haunt 
The knolls of Ida, loveliest in all grace 
Of movement, and the charm of married brows." 

' Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 75 

He prest the blossom of his lips to mine, 
And added, " This was cast upon the board, 
When all the full-faced presence of the Gods 
Ranged in the halls of Peleus ; whereupon 
Rose feud, with question unto whom 't were 

due : 80 

But light-foot Iris brought it yester-eve, 
Delivering, that to me, by common voice 
Elected umpire. Here comes to-day, 
Pallas and Aphrodite, claiming each 
This meed of fairest. Thou, within the cave 85 
Behind yon whispering tuft of oldest pine, 
Mayst well behold them unbeheld, unheard 
Hear all, and see thy Paris judge of Gods." 



(^mont 25 

' Dear mother Ida, barken ere I die. 
It was the deep midnoon : one silvery cloud 90 
Had lost his way between the piney sides 
Of this long glen. Then to the bower they came. 
Naked they came to that smooth-swarded bower, 
And at their feet the crocus brake like fire, 
Violet, amaracus, and asphodel, 95 

Lotos and lilies : and a wind arose. 
And overhead the wandering ivy and vine. 
This way and that, in many a wild festoon 
Ran riot, garlanding the gnarled boughs 
With bunch and berry and flower thro' and thro'. 100 

' O mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
On the tree-tops a crested peacock lit. 
And o'er him flow'd a golden cloud, and lean'd 
Upon him, slowly dropping fragrant dew. 
Then first I heard the voice of her, to whom 105 
Coming thro' Heaven, like a light that grows 
Larger and clearer, with one mind the Gods 
Rise up for reverence. She to Paris made 
Proffer of royal power, ample rule 
Unquestion'd, overflowing revenue no 

Wherewith to embellish state, " from many a vale 
And river-sunder'd champaign clothed with corn, 
Or labour'd mine undrainable of ore. 
Honour," she said, " and homage, tax and toll. 
From many an inland town and haven large, 115 



26 Select ^otnt& of ^tnn^sion 

Mast-throng'd beneath her shadowing citadel 
In glassy bays among her tallest towers." 

' O mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Still she spake on and still she spake of power, 
" Which in all action is the end of all : 120 

Power fitted to the season ; wisdom-bred 
And throned of wisdom — from all neighbour 

crowns 
Alliance and allegiance, till thy hand 
Fail from the sceptre-stafF. Such boon from me. 
From me. Heaven's Queen, Paris, to thee king- 
born, 125 
A shepherd all thy life but yet king-born. 
Should come most welcome, seeing men, in 

power 
Only, are likest gods, who have attained 
Rest in a happy place and quiet seats 
Above the thunder, with undying bliss 130 

In knowledge of their own supremacy." 

' Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
She ceased, and Paris held the costly fruit 
Out at arm's-length, so much the thought of 

power 
Flatter'd his spirit ; but Pallas where she stood 135 
Somewhat apart, her clear and bared limbs 
O'erthwarted with the brazen-headed spear 



(f^tnom 27 

Upon her pearly shoulder leaning cold, 
The while, above, her full and earnest eye 
Over her snow-cold breast and angry cheek 140 
Kept watch, waiting decision, made reply. 

'" Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control, 
These three alone lead life to sovereign power. 
Yet not for power (power of herself 
Would come uncall'd for) but to live by law, 145 
Acting the law we live by without fear ; 
And, because right is right, to follow right 
Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence." 

' Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Again she said : " I woo thee not with gifts. 150 
Sequel of guerdon could not alter me 
To fairer. Judge thou me by what I am. 
So shalt thou find me fairest. 

Yet, indeed, 
If gazing on divinity disrobed 

Thy mortal eyes are frail to judge of fair, 155 

Unbiased by self-profit, oh ! rest thee sure 
That I shall love thee well and cleave to thee, 
So that my vigour, wedded to thy blood, 
Shall strike within thy pulses, like a God's, 
To push thee forward thro' a life of shocks, 160 
Dangers, and deeds, until endurance grow 
Sinew'd with action, and the full-grown will. 



28 Select J^oftttfif of tETenn^fifon 

Circled thro' all experiences, pure law, 
Commeasure perfect freedom." 

' Here she ceased, 
And Paris ponder'd, and I cried, " O Paris, 165 
Give it to Pallas ! " but he heard me not. 
Or hearing would not hear me, woe is me ! 

' O mother Ida, many-fountain'd Ida, 
Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Idalian Aphrodite beautiful, 170 

Fresh as the foam, new-bathed in Paphian wells, 
With rosy slender fingers backward drew 
From her warm brows and bosom her deep hair 
Ambrosial, golden round her lucid throat 
And shoulder : from the violets her light foot 175 
Shone rosy-white, and o'er her rounded form 
Between the shadows of the vine-bunches 
Floated the glowing sunlights, as she moved. 

' Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
She with a subtle smile in her mild eyes, 180 

The herald of her triumph, drawing nigh 
Half-whisper'd in his ear, " I promise thee 
The fairest and most loving wife in Greece." 
She spoke and laugh'd : I shut my sight for fear: 
But when I look'd, Paris had raised his arm, 185 
And I beheld great Here's angry eyes. 
As she withdrew into the golden cloud. 



^mom 29 

And I was left alone within the bower; 
And from that time to this I am alone. 
And I shall be alone until I die. 190 

' Yet, mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Fairest — why fairest wife ? am I not fair ? 
My love hath told me so a thousand times. 
Methinks I must be fair, for yesterday. 
When I passed by, a wild and wanton pard, 195 
Eyed like the evening star, with playful tail 
Crouch'd fawning in the weed. Most loving is 

she ? 
Ah me, my mountain shepherd, that my arms 
Were wound about thee, and my hot lips prest 
Close, close to thine in that quick-falling dew 200 
Of fruitful kisses, thick as Autumn rains 
Flash in the pools of whirling Simois. 

' O mother, hear me yet before I die. 
They came, they cut away my tallest pines. 
My dark tall pines, that plumed the craggy ledge 205 
High over the blue gorge, and all between 
The snowy peak and snow-white cataract 
Foster'd the callow eaglet — from beneath 
Whose thick mysterious boughs in the dark morn 
The panther's roar came muffled, while I sat ^lo 
Low in the valley. Never, never more 
Shall lone CEnone see the morning mist 



30 Select poemsf of Wtnn^son 

Sweep thro' them ; never see them overlaid 
With narrow moon-lit slips of silver cloud, 
Between the loud stream and the trembling stars. 115 

' O mother, hear me yet before I die. 
I wish that somewhere in the ruin'd folds, 
Among the fragments tumbled from the glens, 
Or the dry thickets, I could meet with her. 
The Abominable, that uninvited came aao 

Into the fair Peleian banquet-hall. 
And cast the golden fruit upon the board. 
And bred this change; that I might speak my 

mind. 
And tell her to her face how much I hate 
Her presence, hated both of Gods and men. 225 

' O mother, hear me yet before I die. 
Hath he not sworn his love a thousand times, 
In this green valley, under this green hill, 
Ev'n on this hand, and sitting on this stone ? 
Seal'd it with kisses ? water'd it with tears ? 130 
O happy tears, and how unlike to these ! 
O happy Heaven, how canst thou see my face? 
O happy earth, how canst thou bear my weight ? 

death, death, death, thou ever-floating cloud, 
There are enough unhappy on this earth, 435 
Pass by the happy souls, that love to live : 

1 pray thee, pass before my light of life, 



And shadow all my soul, that I may die. 
Thou weighest heavy on the heart within, 
Weigh heavy on my eyelids : let me die. i^© 

' O mother, hear me yet before I die. 
I will not die alone, for fiery thoughts 
Do shape themselves within me, more and more. 
Whereof I catch the issue, as I hear 
Dead sounds at night come from the inmost 

hills, 245 

Like footsteps upon wool. I dimly see 
My far-ofF doubtful purpose, as a mother 
Conjectures of the features of her child 
Ere it is born : her child ! — a shudder comes 
Across me : never child be born of me, 250 

Unblest, to vex me with his father's eyes ! 

' O mother, hear me yet before I die. 
Hear me, O earth. I will not die alone. 
Lest their shrill happy laughter come to me 
Walking the cold and starless road of Death 255 
Uncomforted, leaving my ancient love 
With the Greek woman. I will rise and go 
Down into Troy, and ere the stars come forth 
Talk with the wild Cassandra, for she says 
A fire dances before her, and a sound 260 

Rings ever in her ears of armed men. 
What this may be I know not, but I know 



32 ^tlttt porm0 of ®mn^0on 

That, wheresoe'er I am by night and day, 
All earth and air seem only burning fire.' 



TO 



WITH THE FOLLOWING POEM 

I SEND you here a sort of allegory, 

(For you will understand it) of a soul, 

A sinful soul possess'd of many gifts, 

A spacious garden full of flowering weeds, 

A glorious Devil, large in heart and brain, 5 

That did love Beauty only, (Beauty seen 

In all varieties of mould and mind) 

And Knowledge for its beauty ; or if Good, 

Good only for its beauty, seeing not 

That Beauty, Good, and Knowledge, are three 

sisters 10 

That doat upon each other, friends to man. 
Living together under the same roof. 
And never can be sunder'd without tears. 
And he that shuts Love out, in turn shall be 
Shut out from Love, and on her threshold lie 15 
Howling in outer darkness. Not for this 
Was common clay ta'en from the common earth, 
Moulded by God, and temper'd with the tears 
Of angels to the perfect shape of man. 



XE^\)t J^alace of art 33 



THE PALACE OF ART 

I BUILT my soul a lordly pleasure-house. 

Wherein at ease for aye to dwell. 
I said, ' O Soul, make merry and carouse. 
Dear soul, for all is well.* 

A huge crag-platform, smooth as burnishM brass 5 

I chose. The ranged ramparts bright 
From level meadow-bases of deep grass 
Suddenly scaled the light. 

Thereon I built it firm. Of ledge or shelf 

The rock rose clear, or winding stair. 10 

My soul would live alone unto herself 
In her high palace there. 

And ' while the world runs round and round,' 
I said, 
' Reign thou apart, a quiet king. 
Still as, while Saturn whirls, his stedfast shade 15 
Sleeps on his luminous ring.* 

To which my soul made answer readily : 

' Trust me, in bliss I shall abide 
In this great mansion, that is built for me, 

So royal-rich and wide.* ao 



34 Select porm0 of ^mn^^Qn 



Four courts I made, East, West and South 
and North, 
In each a squared lawn, wherefrom 
The golden gorge of dragons spouted forth 
A flood of fountain-foam. 

And round the cool green courts there ran a row as 

Of cloisters, branch'd like mighty woods, 
Echoing all night to that sonorous flow 
Of spouted fountain-floods. 

And round the roofs a gilded gallery 

That lent broad verge to distant lands, 30 

Far as the wild swan wings, to where the sky 
Dipt down to sea and sands. 

From those four jets four currents in one swell 

Across the mountain stream'd below 
In misty folds, that floating as they fell 35 

Lit up a torrent-bow. 

And high on every peak a statue seem*d 

To hang on tiptoe, tossing up 
A cloud of incense of all odour steam'd 

From out a golden cup. 40 



®tie l^alace of art 35 

So that she thought, ' And who shall gaze 
upon 
My palace with unblinded eyes, 
While this great bow will waver in the sun, 
And that sweet incense rise ? * 

For that sweet incense rose and never faiPd, 45 

And, while day sank or mounted higher. 
The light aerial gallery, golden-rail'd. 
Burnt like a fringe of fire. 

Likewise the deep-set windows, stain'd and 
traced. 
Would seem slow-flaming crimson fires 50 

From shadow'd grots of arches interlaced. 
And tipt with frost-like spires. 



Full of long sounding corridors it was. 

That over-vaulted grateful gloom. 
Thro' which the livelong day my soul did pass, 55 
Well-pleased, from room to room. 

Full of great rooms and small the palace stood. 

All various, each a perfect whole 
From living Nature, fit for every mood 

And change of my still soul. 60 



36 Select poem0 of tETmn^flfon 

For some were hung with arras green and blue, 

Showing a gaudy summer-morn, 
Where with pufF'd cheek the belted hunter blew 
His wreathed bugle-horn. 

One seem'd all dark and red — a tract of sand, 65 

And some one pacing there alone. 
Who paced for ever in a glimmering land, 
Lit with a low large moon. 

One show'd an iron coast and angry waves. 

You seem'd to hear them climb and fall 7© 

And roar rock-thwarted under bellowing caves, 
Beneath the windy wall. 

And one, a full-fed river winding slow 

By herds upon an endless plain. 
The ragged rims of thunder brooding low, 75 

With shadow-streaks of rain. 

And one, the reapers at their sultry toil. 

In front they bound the sheaves. Behind 
Were realms of upland, prodigal in oil. 

And hoary to the wind. 80 

And one, a foreground black with stones and 
slags, 
Beyond, a line of heights, and higher 



®tie J^alace of art 37 

All barrM with long white cloud the scornful 
crags, 
And highest, snow and fire. 

And one, an English home, — gray twilight 

pourM 85 

On dewy pastures, dewy trees, 
Softer than sleep, — all things in order stored, 
A haunt of ancient Peace. 

Nor these alone, but every landscape fair, 

As fit for every mood of mind, 9® 

Or gay, or grave, or sweet, or stern, was 
there. 
Not less than truth designed. 



Or the maid-mother by a crucifix. 

In tracts of pasture sunny-warm. 
Beneath branch-work of costly sardonyx 95 

Sat smiling, babe in arm. 

Or in a clear-wall'd city on the sea. 
Near gilded organ-pipes, her hair 
Wound with white roses, slept St. Cecily ; 

An angel look'd at her. loo 



38 Select |^oem0 of 3Cenn^0on 

Or thronging all one porch of Paradise, 

A group of Houris bow'd to see 
The dying Islamite, with hands and eyes 
That said, We wait for thee. 

Or mythic Uther's deeply-wounded son 105 

In some fair space of sloping greens 
Lay, dozing in the vale of Avalon, 

And watch'd by weeping queens. 

Or hollowing one hand against his ear. 

To list a footfall, ere he saw no 

The wood-nymph, stay'd the Ausonian king to 
hear 
Of wisdom and of law. 

Or over hills with peaky tops engrail'd. 

And many a tract of palm and rice. 
The throne of Indian Cama slowly sail'd "5 

A summer fann'd with spice. 

Or sweet Europa's mantle blew unclasp'd. 
From off her shoulder backward borne : 
From one hand droop'd a crocus : one hand 
grasp'd 
The mild bull's golden horn. 120 

Or else flushed Ganymede, his rosy thigh 
Half-buried in the Eagle's down. 



W^t l^alace of 3irt 39 

Sole as a flying star shot thro' the sky 
Above the pillar'd town. 

Nor these alone : but every legend fair 125 

Which the supreme Caucasian mind 
Carved out of Nature for itself, was there. 
Not less than life, design'd. 



Then in the towers I placed great bells that 
swung, 
Moved of themselves, with silver sound; 130 
And with choice paintings of wise men I hung 
The royal dais round. 

For there was Milton like a seraph strong. 
Beside him Shakespeare bland and mild ; 
And there the world-worn Dante grasp*d his 

song, 135 

And somewhat grimly smiled. 

And there the Ionian father of the rest ; 

A million wrinkles carved his skin ; 
A hundred winters snow*d upon his breast. 

From cheek and throat and chin. 140 

Above, the fair hall-ceiling stately-set 
Many an arch high up did lift. 



40 §»tlttt l^oems; of ^mn^mn 

And angels rising and descending met 
With interchange of gift. 

Below was all mosaic choicely plann'd H5 

With cycles of the human tale 
Of this wide world, the times of every land 
So wrought, they will not fail. 

The people here, a beast of burden slow, 

Toil'd onward, prick'd with goads and stings ; 150 
Here play'd a tiger, rolling to and fro 
The heads and crowns of kings ; 

Here rose, an athlete, strong to break or bind 

All force in bonds that might endure, 
And here once more like some sick man de- 
clined, 155 
And trusted any cure. 

But over these she trod : and those great bells 

Began to chime. She took her throne : 
She sat betwixt the shining Oriels, 

To sing her songs alone. 160 

And thro' the topmost Oriels' coloured flame 

Two godlike faces gazed below ; 
Plato the wise, and large-brow'd Verulam, 
The first of those who know. 



tETlie l^alace of art 41 

And all those names, that in their motion were 165 

Full-welling fountain-heads of change, 
Betwixt the slender shafts were blazon'd fair 
In diverse raiment strange : 

Thro' which the lights, rose, amber, emerald, 
blue, 
Flush'd in her temples and her eyes, 170 

And from her lips, as morn from Memnon, drew 
Rivers of melodies. 

No nightingale delighteth to prolong 

Her low preamble all alone. 
More than my soul to hear her echo'd song 175 
Throb thro' the ribbed stone ; 

Singing and murmuring in her feastful mirth. 

Joying to feel herself alive, 
Lord over Nature, Lord of the visible earth, 

Lord of the senses five; 180 

Communing with herself: 'All these are mine, 

And let the world have peace or wars, 
*T is one to me/ She — when young night 
divine 
Crown'd dying day with stars. 

Making sweet close of his delicious toils — 185 
Lit light in wreaths and anadems. 



42 Select l^ontifii of ^ntn^flfon 

And pure quintessences of precious oils 
In hollow'd moons of gems, 

To mimic heaven ; and clapt her hands and cried, 

' I marvel if my still delight 190 

In this great house so royal-rich, and wide, 
Be flatterM to the height. 

' O all things fair to sate my various eyes ! 

shapes and hues that please me well ! 

O silent faces of the Great and Wise, 19s 

My Gods, with whom I dwell ! 

' O God-like isolation which art mine, 

1 can but count thee perfect gain. 

What time I watch the darkening droves of 
swine 
That range on yonder plain. 200 

' In filthy sloughs they roll a prurient skin. 

They graze and wallow, breed arnl sleep ; 
And oft some brainless devil enters in. 
And drives them to the deep.' 

Then of the nloral instinct would she prate 205 

And of the rising from the dead. 
As hers by right of full-accomplish'd Fate ; 
And at the last she said : 



®lie palace of arc 43 

' I take possession of man's mind and deed. 

I care not what the sects may brawl. 210 

I sit as God holding no form of creed, 
But contemplating all/ 



Full oft the riddle of the painful earth 

Flash'd thro' her as she sat alone, 
Yet not the less held she her solemn mirth, 215 
And intellectual throne. 

And so she throve and prosper'd : so three years 

She prosper'd : on the fourth she fell, 
Like Herod, when the shout was in his ears. 

Struck thro' with pangs of hell. ixo 

Lest she should fail and perish utterly, 

God, before whom ever lie bare 

The abysmal deeps of Personality, 

Plagued her with sore despair. 

When she would think, where'er she turn'd her 

sight "5 

The airy hand confusion wrought. 
Wrote, '- Mene, mene,' and divided quite 
The kingdom of her thought. 



44 &rlect poems? of tETmn^fifon 

Deep dread and loathing of her solitude 

Fell on her, from which mood was born 130 

Scorn of herself; again, from out that mood 
Laughter at her self-scorn. 

' What ! is not this my place of strength,' she 
said, 
' My spacious mansion built for me, 
Whereof the strong foundation-stones were laid 235 
Since my first memory ? ' 

But in dark corners of her palace stood 

Uncertain shapes ; and unawares 
On white-eyed phantasms weeping tears of blood, 
And horrible nightmares, 240 

And hollow shades enclosing hearts of flame. 

And, with dim fretted foreheads all. 
On corpses three-months-old at noon she came. 
That stood against the wall. 

A spot of dull stagnation, without light 245 

Or power of movement, seem'd my soul, 
'Mid onward-sloping motions infinite 
Making for one sure goal. 

A still salt pool, lock'd in with bars of sand, 

Left on the shore; that hears all night 230 



turtle i^alacr of art 45 

The plunging seas draw backward from the 
land 
Their moon-led waters white. 

A star that with the choral starry dance 

Join'd not, but stood, and standing saw 
The hollow orb of moving Circumstance *S5 

Roll'd round by one fix'd law. 

Back on herself her serpent pride had curl'd. 
' No voice,' she shriek'd in that lone hall, 
' No voice breaks thro' the stillness of this 
world : 
One deep, deep silence all ! ' 260 

She, mouldering with the dull earth's moulder- 
ing sod, 
Inwrapt tenfold in slothful shame, 
Lay there exiled from eternal God, 
Lost to her place and name ; 

And death and life she hated equally, 265 

And nothing saw, for her despair. 
But dreadful time, dreadful eternity, 
No comfort anywhere ; 

Remaining utterly confus'd with fears. 

And ever worse with growing time, 270 



46 S)elect |Boem0 of tlTenn^flfon 

And ever unrelieved by dismal tears, 
And all alone in crime : 

Shut up as in a crumbling tomb, girt round 

With blackness as a solid wall, 
Far off she seem'd to hear the dully sound 175 

Of human footsteps fall. 

As in strange lands a traveller walking slow, 

In doubt and great perplexity, 
A little before moon-rise hears the low 

Moan of an unknown sea ; ago 

And knows not if it be thunder or a sound 
Of rocks thrown down, or one deep cry 
Of great wild beasts; then thinketh, ' I have 
found 
A new land, but I die.' 

She howl'd aloud, ' I am on fire within. 285 

There comes no murmur of reply. 
What is it that will take away my sin, 
And save me lest I die ? ' 

So when four years were wholly finished. 

She threw her royal robes away. 290 

' Make me a cottage in the vale,' she said, 
' Where I may mourn and pray. 



* Yet pull not down my palace towers, that are 

So lightly, beautifully built : 
Perchance I may return with others there 295 

When I have purged my guilt.* 



THE LOTOS-EATERS 

' Courage ! ' he said, and pointed toward the 

land, 
' This mounting wave will roll us shoreward 

soon.' 
In the afternoon they came unto a land 
In which it seemed always afternoon. 
All round the coast the languid air did swoon, 5 
Breathing like one that hath a weary dream. 
Full-faced above the valley stood the moon ; 
And like a downward smoke, the slender stream 
Along the clifF to fall and pause and fall did 

seem. 

A land of streams ! some, like a downward 

smoke, 10 

Slow-dropping veils of thinnest lawn did go ; 

And some thro' wavering lights and shadowy 
broke. 

Rolling a slumbrous sheet of foam below. 

They saw the gleaming river seaward flow 



48 S>elect poemsf of ®mni?0on 

From the inner land : far off, three mountain- 
tops, 15 

Three silent pinnacles of aged snow, 

Stood sunset-flush'd : and, dew'd with showery 
drops, 

Up-clomb the shadowy pine above the woven 
copse. 

The charmed sunset lingerM low adown 

In the red West : thro' mountain clefts the dale 20 

Was seen far inland, and the yellow down 

Border'd with palm, and many a winding vale 

And meadow, set with slender galingale ; 

A land where all things always seem'd the same ! 

And round about the keel with faces pale, 25 

Dark faces pale against that rosy flame. 

The mild-eyed melancholy Lotos-eaters came. 

Branches they bore of that enchanted stem. 
Laden with flower and fruit, whereof they gave 
To each, but whoso did receive of them, 30 

And taste, to him the gushing of the wave 
Far far away did seem to mourn and rave 
On alien shores ; and if his fellow spake. 
His voice was thin, as voices from the grave; 
And deep-asleep he seem'd, yet all awake, 35 

And music in his ears his beating heart did 
make. 



Ctjoric g>ong 49 

They sat them down upon the yellow sand. 
Between the sun and moon upon the shore ; 
And sweet it was to dream of Fatherland, 
Of child, and wife, and slave ; but evermore 40 
Most weary seemM the sea, weary the oar. 
Weary the wandering fields of barren foam. 
Then some one said, ' We will return no more ' ; 
And all at once they sang, ' Our island home 
Is far beyond the wave ; we will no longer 

roam.' 45 



CHORIC SONG 



There is sweet music here that softer falls 

Than petals from blown roses on the grass. 

Or night-dews on still waters between walls 

Of shadowy granite, in a gleaming pass; 

Music that gentlier on the spirit lies, 5° 

Than tir'd eyelids upon tir'd eyes ; 

Music that brings sweet sleep down from the 

blissful skies. 
Here are cool mosses deep. 
And thro' the moss the ivies creep. 
And in the stream the long-leaved flowers weep, 55 
And from the craggy ledge the poppy hangs in 

sleep. 



so ^tlttt ^otmi of tl^mn^&on 

II 

Why are we weigh'd upon with heaviness, 
And utterly consumed with sharp distress, 
While all things else have rest from weariness ? 
All things have rest : why should we toil alone, 60 
We only toil, who are the first of things. 
And make perpetual moan. 
Still from one sorrow to another thrown : 
Nor ever fold our wings. 

And cease from wanderings, g 

Nor steep our brows in slumber's holy balm j 
Nor harken what the inner spirit sings, 
' There is no joy but calm ! ' 
Why should we only toil, the roof and crown 
of things ? 



70 



III 

Lo ! in the middle of the wood. 

The folded leaf is woo'd from out the bud 

With winds upon the branch, and there 

Grows green and broad, and takes no care, 

Sun-steep'd at noon, and in the moon 

Nightly dew-fed ; and turning yellow 

Falls, and floats adown the air. 

Lo ! sweeten'd with the summer light. 

The full-juiced apple, waxing over-mellow, 

Drops in a silent autumn night. 

All its allotted length of days, g^ 



75 



The flower ripens in its place, 

Ripens and fades, and falls, and hath no toil, 

Fast-rooted in the fruitful soil. 

IV 

Hateful is the dark-blue sky, 

Vaulted o'er the dark-blue sea. 85 

Death is the end of life ; ah, why 
Should life all labour be ? 
Let us alone. Time driveth onward fast, 
And in a little while our lips are dumb. 
Let us alone. What is it that will last ? 90 

All things are taken from us, and become 
Portions and parcels of the dreadful Past. 
Let us alone. What pleasure can we have 
To war with evil ? Is there any peace 
In ever climbing up the climbing wave? 95 

All things have rest, and ripen toward the grave 
In silence ; ripen, fall and cease : 
Give us long rest or death, dark death, or 
dreamful ease. 

V 

How sweet it were, hearing the downward 

stream, 
With half-shut eyes ever to seem 100 

Falling asleep in a half-dream ! 
To dream and dream, like yonder amber light. 



52 Select |^orm0 of ®enn^0on 

Which will not leave the myrrh-bush on the 

height ; 
To hear each other's whisper'd speech ; 
Eating the Lotos day by day, 105 

To watch the crisping ripples on the beach, 
And tender curving lines of creamy spray ; 
To lend our hearts and spirits wholly 
To the influence of mild-minded melancholy ; 
To muse and brood and live again in memory, no 
With those old faces of our infancy 
Heap'd over with a mound of grass. 
Two handfuls of white dust, shut in an urn of 

brass ! 

VI 

Dear is the memory of our wedded lives. 

And dear the last embraces of our wives 115 

And their warm tears : but all hath suffered 

change : 
For surely now our household hearths are cold : 
Our sons inherit us : our looks are strange : 
And we should come like ghosts to trouble joy. 
Or else the island princes over-bold 120 

Have eat our substance, and the minstrel sings 
Before them of the ten years' war in Troy, 
And our great deeds, as half-forgotten things. 
Is there confusion in the little isle ? 
Let what is broken so remain. 125 



Cl)oric S)ong 53 

The Gods are hard to reconcile : 
'Tis hard to settle order once again. 
There is confusion worse than death, 
Trouble on trouble, pain on pain, 
Long labour unto aged breath, 13° 

Sore task to hearts worn out by many wars 
And eyes grown dim with gazing on the pilot- 
stars. 

VII 

But, propt on beds of amaranth and moly, 
How sweet (while warm airs lull us, blowing 

lowly) 
With half-dropt eyelid still, 13s 

Beneath a heaven dark and holy, 
To watch the long bright river drawing slowly 
His waters from the purple hill — 
To hear the dewy echoes calling 
From cave to cave thro' the thick-twined 

vine — 140 

To watch the emerald-colour'd water falling 
Thro' many a wov'n acanthus-wreath divine ! 
Only to hear and see the far-ofF sparkling brine. 
Only to hear were sweet, stretch'd out beneath 

the pine. 

VIII 

The Lotos blooms below the barren peak : 145 

The Lotos blows by every winding creek : 



54 Select IBoems; of ^mn^&on 

All day the wind breathes low with mellower 

tone : 
Thro' every hollow cave and alley lone 
Round and round the spicy downs the yellow 

Lotos-dust is blown. 
We have had enough of action, and of motion 

we, 150 

Roll'd to starboard, roU'd to larboard, when the 

surge was seething free. 
Where the wallowing monster spouted his 

foam-fountains in the sea. 
Let us swear an oath, and keep it with an equal 

mind, 
In the hollow Lotos-land to live and lie reclined 
On the hills like Gods together, careless of 

mankind. 155 

For they lie beside their nectar, and the bolts 

are hurl'd 
Far below them in the valleys, and the clouds 

are lightly curl'd 
Round their golden houses, girdled with the 

gleaming world : 
Where they smile in secret, looking over wasted 

lands. 
Blight and famine, plague and earthquake, roar- 
ing deeps and fiery sands, 160 
Clanging fights, and flaming towns, and sinking 

ships, and praying hands. 



Ctioric g)ong 55 

But they smile, they find a music centred in a 
doleful song 

Steaming up, a lamentation and an ancient tale 
of wrong. 

Like a tale of little meaning tho' the words are 
strong ; 

Chanted from an ill-used race of men that 

cleave the soil, 165 

Sow the seed, and reap the harvest with endur- 
ing toil, 

Storing yearly little dues of wheat, and wine 
and oil ; 

Till they perish and they suffer — some, 't is 
whisper'd — down in hell 

Suffer endless anguish, others in Elysian valleys 
dwell. 

Resting weary limbs at last on beds of aspho- 
del. 170 

Surely, surely, slumber is more sweet than toil, 
the shore 

Than labour in the deep mid-ocean, wind and 
wave and oar ; 

Oh rest ye, brother mariners, wc will not wan- 
der more. 



56 Select |5oem0 of Wtnn^^on 



A DREAM OF FAIR WOMEN 

I READ, before my eyelids dropt their shade, 
' The Legend of Good IVomen^ long ago 

Sung by the morning star of song, who made 
His music heard below j 

Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet 

breath 5 

Preluded those melodious bursts that fill 
The spacious times of great Elizabeth 

With sounds that echo still. 

And, for a while, the knowledge of his art 

Held me above the subject, as strong gales 10 

Hold swollen clouds from raining, tho* my 
heart. 
Brimful of those wild tales, 

Charged both mine eyes with tears. In every 
land 

I saw, wherever light illumineth. 
Beauty and anguish walking hand in hand 15 

The downward slope to death. 

Those far-renowned brides of ancient song 
Peopled the hollow dark, like burning stars. 



a SDream of ifair OTomen 57 

And I heard sounds of insult, shame, and wrong. 
And trumpets blown for wars ; 20 

And clattering flints batterM with clanging 
hoofs ; 

And I saw crowds in column'd sanctuaries ; 
And forms that pass'd at windows and on roofs 

Of marble palaces ; 

Corpses across the threshold ; heroes tall as 

Dislodging pinnacle and parapet 
Upon the tortoise creeping to the wall ; 

Lances in ambush set ; 

And high shrine-doors burst thro* with heated 
blasts 

That run before the fluttering tongues of fire ; 30 
White surf wind-scatter'd over sails and masts. 

And ever climbing higher ; 

Squadrons and squares of men in brazen plates. 
Scaffolds, still sheets of water, divers woes, 

Ranges of glimmering vaults with iron grates, 35 
And hush'd seraglios. 

So shape chased shape as swift as, when to land 
Bluster the winds and tides the self-same 
way. 



58 ^tlttt ^otmi of ®enn^fifon 

Crisp foam-flakes scud along the level sand, 

Torn from the fringe of spray. 40 

I started once, or seem*d to start in pain, 

Resolved on noble things, and strove to speak, 

As when a great thought strikes along the brain. 
And flushes all the cheek. 

And once my arm was lifted to hew down 45 

A cavalier from off his saddle-bow. 
That bore a lady from a leaguer'd town ; 

And then, I know not how. 

All those sharp fancies, by down-lapsing thought 
StreamM onward, lost their edges, and did 
creep 50 

Roll'd on each other, rounded, smoothM, and 
brought 
Into the gulfs of sleep. 

At last methought that I had wanderM far 
In an old wood : fresh-wash'd in coolest 
dew 

The maiden splendours of the morning star 55 

Shook in the steadfast blue. 

Enormous elmtree-boles did stoop and lean 
Upon the dusky brushwood underneath 



ai SDream of iFair Momm 59 

Their broad curved branches, fledged with clear- 
est green, 
New from its silken sheath. 60 

The dim red morn had died, her journey done. 
And with dead lips smiled at the twilight 
plain, 

Half-fall'n across the threshold of the sun, 
Never to rise again. 

There was no motion in the dumb dead air, 65 
Not any song of bird or sound of rill ; 

Gross darkness of the inner sepulchre 
Is not so deadly still 

As that wide forest. Growths of jasmine turn'd 
Their humid arms festooning tree to tree, 70 

And at the root thro' lush green grasses burn'd 
The red anemone. 

I knew the flowers, I knew the leaves, I knew 
The tearful glimmer of the languid dawn 

On those long, rank, dark wood-walks drench'd 

in dew, 75 

Leading from lawn to lawn. 

The smell of violets, hidden in the green, 
Pour'd back into my empty soul and frame 



6o g^elect J0orm0 of ®mn^0on 

The times when I remember to have been 

Joyful and free from blame. So 

And from within me a clear under-tone 

Thrill'd thro' mine ears in that unblissful 
clime, 
' Pass freely thro ' : the wood is all thine 
own, 
Until the end of time.' 

At length I saw a lady within call, 85 

Stiller than chiselled marble, standing there ; 

A daughter of the gods, divinely tall, 
And most divinely fair. 

Her loveliness with shame and with surprise 
Froze my swift speech : she turning on my 
face 90 

The star-like sorrows of immortal eyes, 
Spoke slowly in her place. 

' I had great beauty : ask thou not my name : 
No one can be more wise than destiny. 

Many drew swords and died. Where'er I came 95 
I brought calamity.' 

' No marvel, sovereign lady : in fair field 
Myself for such a face had boldly died,' 



a Wttditn of Sfm Momen 6i 

I answer'd free ; and turning I appeal'd 

To one that stood beside. loo 

But she, with sick and scornful looks averse, 
To her full height her stately stature draws ; 

' My youth,' she said, ' was blasted with a curse : 
This woman was the cause. 

' I was cut off from hope in that sad place, 105 
Which men call'd Aulis in those iron years ; 

My father held his hand upon his face ; 
I, blinded with my tears, 

' Still strove to speak : my voice was thick with 
sighs 

As in a dream. Dimly I could descry no 

The stern black-bearded kings with wolfish eyes, 

Waiting to see me die. 

* The high masts flicker'd as they lay afloat ; 

The crowds, the temples, waver'd, and the 
shore ; 
The bright death quiver'd at the victim's throat ; 1 15 

Touch'd ; and I knew no more/ 

I13-116. 1833-1853 : 

The tall masts quivered as they lay afloat. 

The temples and the people and the shore. 

One drew a sharp knife thro' my tender throat 
Slowly, — and nothing more. 



62 Select |aoem0 of ^enn^0on 

Whereto the other with a downward brow : 
'I would the white cold heavy-plunging foam, 

Whirl'd by the wind, had roll'd me deep below. 
Then when I left my home.* lao 

Her slow full words sank thro' the silence drear. 
As thunder-drops fall on a sleeping sea ; 

Sudden I heard a voice that cried, ' Come here. 
That I may look on thee.* 

I turning saw, throned on a flowery rise, "5 

One sitting on a crimson scarf unroll'd ; 

A queen, with swarthy cheeks and bold black 
eyes. 
Brow-bound with burning gold. 

She, flashing forth a haughty smile, began : 

' I govern'd men by change, and so I sway'di3o 

All moods. 'Tis long since I have seen a man. 
Once, like the moon, I made 

' The ever-shifting currents of the blood 
According to my humour ebb and flow. 

I have no men to govern in this wood : 135 

That makes my only woe. 

' Nay — yet it chafes me that I could not bend 
One will ; nor tame and tutor with mine eye 



at ISDream of jfait Women 63 

That dull cold-blooded Caesar. Prythee, friend, 
Where is Mark Antony ? 140 

* The man, my lover, with whom I rode sub- 
lime 
On Fortune's neck : we sat as God by 
God: 
The Nilus would have risen before his time 
And flooded at our nod. 

' We drank the Libyan Sun to sleep, and lit 145 
Lamps which out-burn'd Canopus. O my 
life 

In Egypt ! O the dalliance and the wit. 
The flattery and the strife, 

' And the wild kiss, when fresh from war*s 
alarms, 

My Hercules, my Roman Antony, 150 

My mailed Bacchus leapt into my arms. 

Contented there to die ! 

' And there he died : and when I heard my 
name 
Sigh'd forth with life I would not brook my 
fear 
Of the other : with a worm I balkM his fame. 155 
What else was left ? look here ! * 



64 ^tlttt poem0 of t!renn^0on 

(With that she tore her robe apart, and half 
The polish'd argent of her breast to sight 

Laid bare. Thereto she pointed with a laugh, 
Showing the aspick's bite.) i6o 

' I died a Queen. The Roman soldier found 
Me lying dead, my crown about my brows, 

A name for ever ! — lying robed and crown'd, 
Worthy a Roman spouse.' 

Her warbling voice, a lyre of widest range 165 

Struck by all passion, did fall down and 
glance 

From tone to tone, and glided thro* all change 
Of liveliest utterance. 

When she made pause I knew not for delight ; 

Because with sudden motion from the ground 170 
She raised her piercing orbs, and fill'd with light 

The interval of sound. 

Still with their fires Love tipt his keenest darts ; 

As once they drew into two burning rings 
All beams of Love, melting the mighty hearts 175 

Of captains and of kings. 

Slowly my sense undazzled. Then I heard 
A noise of some one coming thro' the lawn, 



at SDream of iFair Women 65 

And singing clearer than the crested bird, 

That claps his wings at dawn. i8o 

' The torrent brooks of hallow'd Israel 

From craggy hollows pouring, late and soon, 

Sound all night long, in falling thro' the dell. 
Far-heard beneath the moon. 

' The balmy moon of blessed Israel 185 

Floods all the deep-blue gloom with beams 
divine : 
All night the spHnter'd crags that wall the 
dell 
With spires of silver shine.* 

As one that museth where broad sunshine laves 
The lawn by some cathedral, thro' the door 190 

Hearing the holy organ rolling waves 
Of sound on roof and floor 

Within, and anthem sung, is charm'd and tied 
To where he stands, — so stood I, when that 
flow 

Of music left the lips of her that died 195 

To save her father's vow ; 

The daughter of the warrior Gileadite, 
A maiden pure ; as when she went along 



66 Select J^oemsf of tB^tnn^ion 

From Mizpeh's tower'd gate with welcome light, 
With timbrel and with song. 200 

My words leapt forth : ' Heaven heads the count 
of crimes 
With that wild oath.' She rendered answer 
high : 
' Not so, nor once alone ; a thousand times 
I would be born and die. 

' Single I grew, like some green plant, whose 

root ao5 

Creeps to the garden water-pipes beneath. 
Feeding the flower ; but ere my flower to fruit 

Changed, I was ripe for death. 

' My God, my land, my father — these did move 
Me from my bliss of life, that Nature gave, 210 

Lower'd softly with a threefold cord of love 
Down to a silent grave. 

' And I went mourning, " No fair Hebrew boy 
Shall smile away my maiden blame among 

The Hebrew mothers " — emptied of all joy, 215 
Leaving the dance and song, 

' Leaving the olive-gardens far below. 

Leaving the promise of my bridal bower. 



at 2E>ream of iFair Wiomtn 67 

The valleys of grape-loaded vines that glow 

Beneath the battled tower. **o 



' The light white cloud swam over us. Anon 
We heard the lion roaring from his den ; 

We saw the large white stars rise one by one, 
Or, from the darken 'd glen, 

' Saw God divide the night with flying flame, a^s 
And thunder on the everlasting hills. 

I heard Him, for He spake, and grief became 
A solemn scorn of ills. 

' When the next moon was roll'd into the sky, 
Strength came to me that equalfd my desire. 230 

How beautiful a thing it was to die 
For God and for my sire ! 

' It comforts me in this one thought to dwell. 
That I subdued me to my father*s will; 

Because the kiss he gave me, ere I fell, *35 

Sweetens the spirit still. 

' Moreover it is written that my race 

Hew'd Ammon, hip and thigh, from Aroer 

On Arnon unto Minneth.' Here her face 

Glow'd, as I look'd at her. M© 



68 g)rlect |0orm0 of tTTmn^flfon 

She lock'd her lips ; she left me where I stood : 
' Glory to God,' she sang, and past afar, 

Thridding the sombre boskage of the wood, 
Toward the morning-star. 

Losing her carol I stood pensively, 145 

As one that from a casement leans his head, 

When midnight bells cease ringing suddenly, 
And the old year is dead. 

' Alas ! alas ! * a low voice, full of care, 

Murmur'd beside me : ' Turn and look on 
me : 150 

I am that Rosamond, whom men call fair. 
If what I was I be. 

' Would I had been some maiden coarse and 
poor ! 

O me, that I should ever see the light ! 
Those dragon eyes of anger'd Eleanor ^55 

Do hunt me, day and night.' 

She ceased in tears, fallen from hope and trust: 
To whom the Egyptian : ' O, you tamely 
died! 
You should have clung to P'ulvia's waist, and 
thrust 
The dagger thro' her side.' 260 



31 Dream of ifair Women 69 

With that sharp sound the white dawn's creep- 
ing beams, 

Stol'n to my brain, dissolved the mystery 
Of folded sleep. The captain of my dreams 

Ruled in the eastern sky. 

Morn broaden'd on the borders of the dark, 265 
Ere I saw her, who clasp'd in her last trance 

Her murder'd father's head, or Joan of Arc, 
A light of ancient France ; 

Or her, who knew that Love can vanquish 
Death, 
Who kneeling, with one arm about her 
king, 270 

Drew forth the poison with her balmy breath, 
Sweet as new buds in Spring. 

No memory labours longer from the deep 
Gold-mines of thought to lift the hidden ore 

That glimpses, moving up, than I from sleep 275 
To gather and tell o'er 

Each little sound and sight. With what dull 
pain 

Compass'd, how eagerly I sought to strike 
Into that wondrous track of dreams again ! 

But no two dreams are like. 280 



70 g^elect poem0 of tBmn^^on 

As when a soul laments, which hath been blest, 
Desiring what is mingled with past years. 

In yearnings that can never be exprest 
By signs or groans or tears ; 

Because all words, tho' cullM with choicest 

art, 285 

Failing to give the bitter of the sweet, 
Wither beneath the palate, and the heart 

Faints, faded by its heat. 



TO J. S. 

The wind, that beats the mountain, blows 
More softly round the open wold. 

And gently comes the world to those 
That are cast in gentle mould. 

And me this knowledge bolder made, 5 

Or else I had not dared to flow 
In these words toward you, and invade 

Even with a verse your holy woe. 

'T is strange that those we lean on most. 

Those in whose laps our limbs are nursed, 10 

Fall into shadow, soonest lost : 

Those we love first are taken first. 



^0 31* §>♦ 71 

God gives us love. Something to love 

He lends us ; but, when love is grown 

To ripeness, that on which it throve »5 

Falls ofF, and love is left alone. 

This is the curse of time. Alas ! 

In grief I am not all unlearnM ; 
Once thro* mine own doors Death did pass ; 

One went, who never hath returned. 20 

He will not smile — not speak to me 

Once more. Two years his chair is seen 

Empty before us. That was he 

Without whose life I had not been. 

Your loss is rarer ; for this star 2,5 

Rose with you thro' a little arc 
Of heaven, nor having wander'd far 

Shot on the sudden into dark. 

I knew your brother : his mute dust 

I honour and his living worth : 30 

A man more pure and bold and just 

Was never born into the earth. 

I have not look'd upon you nigh, 

Since that dear soul hath fall'n asleep. 

Great Nature is more wise than I : 35 

I will not tell you not to weep. 



72 ^tlttt ^otmi of t!rmn^0on 

And tho' mine own eyes fill with dew, 

Drawn from the spirit thro' the brain, 

I will not even preach to you, 

' Weep, weeping dulls the inward pain.' 40 

Let Grief be her own mistress still. 

She loveth her own anguish deep 
More than much pleasure. Let her will 

Be done — to weep or not to weep. 

I will not say, ' God's ordinance 45 

Of Death is blown in every wind;' 

For that is not a common chance 
That takes away a noble mind. 

His memory long will live alone 

In all our hearts, as mournful light 50 

That broods above the fallen sun. 

And dwells in heaven half the night. 

Vain solace ! Memory standing near 

Cast down her eyes, and in her throat 

Her voice seem'd distant, and a tear 55 

Dropt on the letters as I wrote. 

I wrote I know not what. In truth. 
How should I soothe you anyway. 

Who miss the brother of your youth ? 

Yet something I did wish to say : 60 



^0 31* ^. 73 

For he too was a friend to me : 

Both are my friends, and my true breast 
Bleedeth for both ; yet it may be 

That only silence suiteth best. 

Words weaker than your grief would make 65 

Grief more. 'Twere better I should cease 

Although myself could almost take 

The place of him that sleeps in peace. 

Sleep sweetly, tender heart, in peace : 

Sleep, holy spirit, blessed soul, 70 

While the stars burn, the moons increase, 

And the great ages onward roll. 

Sleep till the end, true soul and sweet. 

Nothing comes to thee new or strange. 
Sleep full of rest from head to feet ; 75 

Lie still, dry dust, secure of change. 



ENGLISH IDYLLS AND OTHER 
POEMS. 1842. 



MORTE D'ARTHUR 

So all day long the noise of battle roll'd 

Among the mountains by the winter sea ; 

Until King Arthur's table, man by man, 

Had fallen in Lyonnesse about their Lord, 

King Arthur : then, because his wound was deep, 5 

The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him. 

Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights. 

And bore him to a chapel nigh the field, 

A broken chancel with a broken cross, 

That stood on a dark strait of barren land. 10 

On one side lay the Ocean, and on one 

Lay a great water, and the moon was full. 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere : 
' The sequel of to-day unsolders all 
The goodliest fellowship of famous knights 15 

Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep 
They sleep — the men I loved. I think that we 
Shall never more at any future time. 
Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds. 



^orte W3itt^nt 75 

Walking about the gardens and the halls 2,0 

Of Camelot, as in the days that were. 
I perish by this people which I made, — 
Tho' Merlin sware that I should come again 
To rule once more — but let what will be, be, 
I am so deeply smitten thro' the helm 25 

That without help I cannot last till morn. 
Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur, 
Which was my pride: for thou rememberest 

how 
In those old days, one summer noon, an arm 
Rose up from out the bosom of the lake, 30 

Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful. 
Holding the sword — and how I rowed across 
And took it, and have worn it, like a king : 
And, wheresoever I am sung or told 
In aftertime, this also shall be known : 35 

But now delay not : take Excalibur, 
And fling him far into the middle mere : 
Watch what thou seest, and lightly bring me 

word.* 

To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' It is not meet. Sir King, to leave thee thus, 40 
Aidless, alone, and smitten thro' the helm. 
A little thing may harm a wounded man. 
Yet I thy best will all perform at full. 
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word.' 



76 g>elect ^otm$ of ®enn^0on 

So saying, from the ruin'd shrine he stept 45 
And in the moon athwart the place of tombs, 
Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men. 
Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang 
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping 

down 
By zig-zag paths, and juts of pointed rock, 50 

Came on the shining levels of the lake. 

There drew he forth the brand Excalibur, 
And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon, 
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth 
And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt : 55 
For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks, 
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work 
Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long 
That both his eyes were dazzled, as he stood. 
This way and that dividing the swift mind, 60 

In act to throw : but at the last it seem'd 
Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd 
There in the many-knotted waterflags, 
That whistled stiff and dry about the marge. 
So strode he back slow to the wounded king. 65 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere : 
' Hast thou performed my mission which I gave ? 
What is it thou hast seen ? or what hast heard ? * 

56. 1 842-1 85 3. studs. 



^orte HD'^rttjui: 77 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' I heard the ripple washing in the reeds, 70 

And the wild water lapping on the crag/ 

To whom replied King Arthur, faint and 
pale : 
' Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy name. 
Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd 
Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight : 75 

For surer sign had foUow'd, either hand, 
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere. 
This is a shameful thing for men to lie. 
Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again 
As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing 80 

I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word.' 

Then went Sir Bedivere the second time 
Across the ridge, and paced beside the mere. 
Counting the dewy pebbles, fix'd in thought ; 
But when he saw the wonder of the hilt, 85 

How curiously and strangely chased, he smote 
His palms together, and he cried aloud. 

' And if indeed I cast the brand away, 
Surely a precious thing, one worthy note, 
Should thus be lost for ever from the earth, 90 

Which might have pleased the eyes of many 
men. 



78 Select J^orms of ®enn^0on 

What good should follow this, if this were 

done ? 
What harm, undone ? deep harm to disobey, 
Seeing obedience is the bond of rule. 
Were it well to obey then, if a king demand 95 
An act unprofitable, against himself ? 
The King is sick, and knows not what he does. 
What record, or what relic of my lord 
Should be to aftertime, but empty breath 
And rumors of a doubt ? but were this kept, 100 
Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings. 
Some one might show it at a joust of arms, 
Saying, " King Arthur's sword, Excalibur, 
Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake. 
Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the deeps 105 
Upon the hidden bases of the hills." 
So might some old man speak in the aftertime 
To all the people, winning reverence. 
But now much honour and much fame were 

lost.' 

So spake he, clouded with his own conceit, no 
And hid Excalibur the second time. 
And so strode back slow to the wounded King. 

Then spoke King Arthur, breathing heavily : 
' What is it thou hast seen ? or what hast 
heard ? ' 



^orte SD'Sirtljur 79 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : "5 

* I heard the water lapping on the crag, 
And the long ripple washing in the reeds/ 

To whom replied King Arthur, much in 

wrath : 
' Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue, 
Unknightly, traitor-hearted ! Woe is me ! 120 

Authority forgets a dying king. 
Laid widow'd of the power in his eye 
That bow'd the will. I see thee what thou 

art. 
For thou, the latest-left of all my knights, 
In whom should meet the offices of all, 1^5 

Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt ; 
Either from lust of gold, or like a girl 
Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes. 
Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice. 
And the third time may prosper, get thee hence j 130 
But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur, 
I will arise and slay thee with my hands.' 

Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran. 
And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged 
Among the bulrush-beds, and clutch'd the sword, 135 
And strongly wheel'd and threw it. The great 

brand 
Made lightnings in the splendour of the moon. 



8o ^tltct ponn0 of ®mn^fi?on 

And flashing round and round, and whirl'd in an 

arch, 
Shot like a streamer of the northern morn, 
Seen where the moving isles of winter shock 140 
By night, with noises of the northern sea. 
So flash'd and fell the brand Excalibur : 
But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm 
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful. 
And caught him by the hilt, and brandished 

him 145 

Three times, and drew him under in the mere. 
And lightly went the other to the King. 

Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker 
breath : 
' Now see I by thine eyes that this is done. 
Speak out : what is it thou hast heard, or seen ? ' 15® 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems 
Should blind my purpose, for I never saw. 
Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die, 
Not tho' I live three lives of mortal men, 155 

So great a miracle as yonder hilt. 
Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling 

him ; 
But when I look'd again, behold an arm. 
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful, 



^orte 2[>'3irtt)ur 81 

That caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd 

him 160 

Three times, and drew him under in the mere.' 

And answer made King Arthur, breathing 
hard : 
' My end draws nigh ; 'tis time that I were gone, 
Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight. 
And bear me to the margin ; yet I fear 165 

My wound hath taken cold, and I shall die.' 

So saying, from the pavement he half rose, 
Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm. 
And looking wistfully with wide blue eyes 
As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere 170 

Remorsefully regarded thro' his tears. 
And would have spoken, but he found not words, 
Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee. 
O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands, 
And rising bore him thro' the place of tombs. 175 

But, as he walk'd. King Arthur panted hard, 
Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed 
When all the house is mute. So sigh'd the King, 
Muttering and murmuring at his ear ' Quick, 

quick ! 
I fear it is too late, and I shall die.' 180 

But the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge, 



82 g)elect l^onnfif of tCrnn^0on 

Clothed with his breath, and looking, as he 

walk'd, 
Larger than human on the frozen hills. 
He heard the deep behind him, and a cry 
Before. His own thought drove him, like a 

goad. ^ 185 

Dry clashM his harness in the icy caves 
And barren chasms, and all to left and right 
The bare black clifF clang'd round him, as he 

based 
His feet on juts of slippery crag that rang 
Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels — 190 
And on a sudden, lo ! the level lake. 
And the long glories of the winter moon. 

Then saw they how there hove a dusky barge, 
Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern, 
Beneath them ; and descending they were ware 195 
That all the decks were dense with stately forms 
Black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream - — by 

these 
Three Queens with crowns of gold — and from 

them rose 
A cry that shiver'd to the tingling stars, 
And, as it were one voice, an agony 200 

Of lamentation, like a wind, that shrills 
All night in a waste land, where no one comes. 
Or hath come, since the making of the world. 



^orte SD'artljur 83 

Then murmur'd Arthur, ' Place me in the 

barge.' 
So to the barge they came. There those three 

Queens 205 

Put forth their hands, and took the King, and 

wept. 
But she, that rose the tallest of them all 
And fairest, laid his head upon her lap, 
And loosed the shatter'd casque, and chafed his 

hands. 
And caird him by his name, complaining loud, 210 
And dropping bitter tears against his brow 
Striped with dark blood : for all his face was 

white 
And colourless, and like the wither'd moon 
Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east ; 
And all his greaves and cuisses dash'd with 

drops 215 

Of onset ; and the light and lustrous curls — 
That made his forehead like a rising sun 
High from the dais-throne — were parch'd with 

dust ; 
Or, clotted into points and hanging loose, 
Mix'd with the knightly growth that fringed his 

lips. Z20 

So like a shattered column lay the King ; 
Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest, 
From spur to plume a star of tournament. 



84 Select poem0 of ®mn^0on 

Shot thro' the lists at Camelot, and charged 
Before the eyes of ladies and of kings. azs 

Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' Ah ! my Lord Arthur, whither shall I go ? 
Where shall I hide my forehead and my eyes? 
For now I see the true old times are dead, 
When every morning brought a noble chance, 2.3c? 
And every chance brought out a noble knight. 
Such times have been not since the light that led 
The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh. 
But now the whole round table is dissolved 
Which was an image of the mighty world, ^35 

And I, the last, go forth companionless. 
And the days darken round me, and the years. 
Among new men, strange faces, other minds.' 

And slowly answer'd Arthur from the barge : 
' The old order changeth, yielding place to new, 240 
And God fulfils Himself in many ways. 
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world. 
Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me ? 
I have lived my life, and that which I have 

done 
May He within Himself make pure ! but thou, 245 
If thou shouldst never see my face again. 
Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by 

prayer 



^orte 2r>'3irtt)ur 85 

Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy 

voice 
Rise like a fountain for me night and day. 
For what are men better than sheep or goats ^5° 
That nourish a blind life within the brain, 
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer 
Both for themselves and those who call them 

friend ? 
For so the whole round earth is every way 
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God. ^55 
But now farewell. I am going a long way 
With these thou seest — if indeed I go — 
(For all my mind is clouded with a doubt) 
To the island-valley of Avilion ; 
Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, 2,60 

Nor ever wind blows loudly ; but it lies 
Deep-meadow'd, happy, fair with orchard lawns 
And bowery hollows crownM with summer sea. 
Where I will heal me of my grievous wound.' 

So said he, and the barge with oar and sail 265 
Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted 

swan — 
That, fluting a wild carol ere her death. 
Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood 
With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere 
Revolving many memories, till the hull ^7° 

Look'd the black dot against the verge of dawn, 
And on the mere the wailing died away. 



86 Select ^otm& of ^tnn^&on 

THE GARDENER'S DAUGHTER; 

OR THE PICTURES 

This morning is the morning of the day, 
When I and Eustace from the city went 
To see the Gardener's daughter; I and he, 
Brothers in Art ; a friendship so complete 
Portioned in halves between us, that we grew 5 
The fable of the city where we dwelt. 

My Eustace might have sat for Hercules ; 
So muscular he spread, so broad of breast. 
He, by some law that holds in love, and draws 
The greater to the lesser, long desired 10 

A certain miracle of symmetry, 
A miniature of loveliness, all grace 
Summ'd up and closed in little; — Juliet, she 
So light of foot, so light of spirit — oh, she 
To me myself, for some three careless moons, 15 
The summer pilot of an empty heart 
Unto the shores of nothing. Know you not 
Such touches are but embassies of love. 
To tamper with the feelings till he found 
Empire for life ? but Eustace painted her, ^c 

And said to me, she sitting with us then, 
' When will you paint like this ? and I replied, 
(My words were half in earnest, half in jest,) 



tE^tie ^arDener'0 SDaugJiter 87 

' 'T is not your work, but Love's. Love, un- 

perceived, 
A more ideal Artist he than all, *5 

Came, drew your pencil from you, made those 

eyes 
Darker than darkest pansies, and that hair 
More black than ashbuds in the front of March.' 
And Juliet answer'd laughing, ' Go and see 
The Gardener's daughter : trust me, after that, 3° 
You scarce can fail to match his masterpiece.' 
And up we rose, and on the spur we went. 

Not wholly in the busy world, nor quite 
Beyond it, blooms the garden that I love. 
News from the humming city comes to it 35 

In sound of funeral or of marriage bells ; 
And, sitting muffled in dark leaves, you hear 
The windy clanging of the minster clock ; 
Although between it and the garden lies 
A league of grass, wash'd by a slow broad stream, 4° 
That, stirr'd with languid pulses of the oar. 
Waves all its lazy lilies, and creeps on. 
Barge-laden, to three arches of a bridge 
Crown'd with the minster-towers. 

The fields between 
Are dewy-fresh, browsed by deep-udder'd kine, 45 
And all about the large lime feathers low. 
The lime a summer home of murmurous wings. 



88 ^tltct ^otm& of tKenn^^on 

In that still place she, hoarded in herself, 
Grew, seldom seen ; not less among us lived 
Her fame from lip to lip. Who had not heard 5-' 
Of Rose, the Gardener's daughter ? Where 

was he. 
So blunt in memory, so old at heart. 
At such a distance from his youth in grief. 
That, having seen, forgot ? The common mouth. 
So gross to express delight, in praise of her 55 

Grew oratory. Such a lord is Love, 
And Beauty such a mistress of the world. 

And if I said that Fancy, led by Love, 
Would play with flying forms and images. 
Yet this is also true, that, long before 6o 

I look'd upon her, when I heard her name 
My heart was like a prophet to my heart. 
And told me I should love. A crowd of hopes. 
That sought to sow themselves like winged 

seeds. 
Born out of everything I heard and saw, ^5 

Flutter'd about my senses and my soul ; 
And vague desires, like fitful blasts of balm 
To one that travels quickly, made the air 
Of Life delicious, and all kinds of thought. 
That verged upon them, sweeter than the dream 7° 
Dream'd by a happy man, when the dark East, 
Unseen, is brightening to his bridal morn. 



®lie <fi>arDener'0 2E>augt)ter 89 

And sure this orbit of the memory folds 
For ever in itself the day we went 
To see her. All the land in flowery squares, 75 
Beneath a broad and equal-blowing wind, 
Smelt of the coming summer, as one large cloud 
Drew downward : but all else of heaven was 

pure 
Up to the Sun, and May from verge to verge, 
And May with me from head to heel. And now, 80 
As tho' 'twere yesterday, as tho' it were 
The hour just flown, that morn with all its 

sound, 
(For those old Mays had thrice the life of 

these). 
Rings in mine ears. The steer forgot to graze. 
And, where the hedge-row cuts the pathway, 

stood, 85 

Leaning his horns into the neighbour field. 
And lowing to his fellows. From the woods 
Came voices of the well-contented doves. 
The lark could scarce get out his notes for joy, 
But shook his song together as he near'd 90 

His happy home, the ground. To left and 

right. 
The cuckoo told his name to all the hills ; 
The mellow ouzel fluted in the elm ; 
The redcap whistled ; and the nightingale 
Sang loud, as tho' he were the bird of day. 95 



90 Select poemfif of ®enn^0on 

And Eustace turn'd, and smiling said to me, 
' Hear how the bushes echo ! by my life, 
These birds have joyful thoughts. Think you 

they sing 
Like poets, from the vanity of song ? 
Or have they any sense of why they sing ? loo 

And would they praise the heavens for what 

they have ? ' 
And I made answer, ' Were there nothing 

else 
For which to praise the heavens but only love, 
That only love were cause enough for praise.* 

Lightly he laugh'd, as one that read my 
thought, los 

And on we went ; but ere an hour had pass'd. 
We reachM a meadow slanting to the North ; 
Down which a well-worn pathway courted us 
To one green wicket in a privet hedge ; 
This, yielding, gave into a grassy walk no 

Thro* crowded lilac-ambush trimly pruned ; 
And one warm gust, full-fed with perfume, 

blew 
Beyond us, as we enter'd in the cool. 
The garden stretches southward. In the midst 
A cedar spread his dark-green layers of shade. 115 
The garden-glasses glanced, and momently 
The twinkling laurel scatter'd silver lights. 



' Eustace,' I said, ' this wonder keeps the 

house.' 
He nodded, but a moment afterwards 
He cried, ' Look ! look ! ' Before he ceased I 

turn'd, 120 

And, ere a star can wink, beheld her there. 

For up the porch there grew an Eastern rose, 
That, flowering high, the last night's gale had 

caught. 
And blown across the walk. One arm aloft — 
Gown'd in pure white, that fitted to the 

shape — • 145 

Holding the bush, to fix it back, she stood, 
A single stream of all her soft brown hair 
Pour'd on one side : the shadow of the flowers 
Stole all the golden gloss, and, wavering 
Lovingly lower, trembled on her waist — 130 

Ah happy shade — and still went wavering down. 
But ere it touch'd a foot, that might have danced 
The greensward into greener circles, dipt. 
And mix'd with shadows of the common ground ! 
But the full day dwelt on her brows, and sunn'di35 
Her violet eyes and all her Hebe bloom. 
And doubled her own warmth against her lips. 
And on the bounteous wave of such a breast 
As never pencil drew. Half light, half shade, 
She stood, a sight to make an old man young. 140 



92 Select ponn0 of ®mn^0on 

So rapt, we near'd the house ; but she, a 

Rose 
In roses, mingled with her fragrant toil, 
Nor heard us come nor from her tendance 

turn'd 
Into the world without ; till close at hand. 
And almost ere I knew mine own intent, HS 

This murmur broke the stillness of that air 
Which brooded round about her : 

' Ah, one rose. 
One rose, but one, by those fair fingers cull'd 
Were worth a hundred kisses press'd on lips 
Less exquisite than thine.' 

She look'd : but all 150 
Suffused with blushes — neither self-possess'd 
Nor startled, but betwixt this mood and that. 
Divided in a graceful quiet — paused. 
And dropt the branch she held, and turning, 

wound 
Her looser hair in braid, and stirr'd her lips 155 
For some sweet answer, tho' no answer came. 
Nor yet refused the rose, but granted it. 
And moved away, and left me, statue-like. 
In act to render thanks. 

I, that whole day. 
Saw her no more, altho' I linger'd there 160 

Till every daisy slept, and Love's white star 
Beam'd thro' the thicken'd cedar in the dusk. 



tETtje (5arDener'0 SDaugfjter 93 

So home we went, and all the livelong way 
With solemn gibe did Eustice banter me. 
' Now,' said he,' will you climb the top of Art. 165 
You cannot fail to work in hues to dim 
The Titianic Flora. Will you match 
My Juliet ? you, not you, — the Master, Love, 
A more ideal Artist he than all.' 

So home I went and could not sleep for joy, 170 
Reading her perfect features in the gloom. 
Kissing the rose she gave me o'er and o'er. 
And shaping faithful record of a glance 
That graced the giving — such a noise of life 
Swarm'd in the golden present, such a voice 175 
Call'd to me from the years to come, and such 
A length of bright horizon rimm'd the dark. 
And all that night I heard the watchman peal 
The sliding season : all that night I heard 
The heavy clocks knolling the drowsy hours. 180 
The drowsy hours, dispensers of all good. 
O'er the mute city stole with folded wings, 
Distilling odours on me as they went 
To greet their fairer sisters of the East. 

Love at first sight, first-born, and heir to all 185 
Made this night thus. Henceforward squall nor 

storm 
Could keep me from the Eden where she dwelt. 



94 Select potma of tH^enn^^on 

Light pretexts drew me ; sometimes a Dutch 

love 
For tulips ; then for roses, moss, or musk. 
To grace my city rooms; or fruits and cream 190 
Served in the weeping elm ; and more and more 
A word could bring the colour to her cheek ; 
A thought would fill my eyes with happy dew ; 
Love trebled life within me, and with each 
The year increased. 

The daughters of the year, 195 
One after one, thro* that still garden pass'd; 
Each garlanded with her peculiar flower 
Danced into light, and died into the shade ; 
And each in passing touch'd with some new 

grace 
Or seem'd to touch her, so that day by day, ^°o 
Like one that never can be wholly known, 
Her beauty grew ; till Autumn brought an hour 
For Eustace, when I heard his deep ' I will,* 
Breathed, like the covenant of a God, to hold 
From thence thro' all the worlds : but I rose up 205 
Full of his bliss, and following her dark eyes 
Felt earth as air beneath me, till I reach'd 
The wicket-gate and found her standing there. 

There sat we down upon a garden mound, 
Two mutually enfolded ; Love, the third, ^'o 

Between us, in the circle of his arms 



tETtje ^arDrner'fif HDaugtiter 95 

Enwound us both ; and over many a range 
Of waning lime the gray cathedral towers, 
Across a hazy glimmer of the west, 
Reveal'd their shining windows : from them 

clash'd "5 

The bells; we listen'd; with the time we playM, 
We spoke of other things ; we coursed about 
The subject most at heart, more near and near. 
Like doves about a dovecote, wheeling round 
The central wish until we settled there. ^^° 

Then, in that time and place, I spoke to her, 
Requiring, tho' I knew it was mine own. 
Yet for the pleasure that I took to hear. 
Requiring at her hand the greatest gift, 
A woman's heart, the heart of her I loved ; 225 
And in that time and place she answerM me. 
And in the compass of three little words. 
More musical than ever came in one. 
The silver fragments of a broken voice, 
Made me most happy, faltering ' I am thine.' 230 

Shall I cease here ? Is this enough to say 
That my desire, like all strongest hopes. 
By its own energy fulfill'd itself. 
Merged in completion ? Would you learn at 

full 
How passion rose thro* circumstantial grades ^35 



96 Select l^oems? of Wmn^non 

Beyond all grades develop'd ? and indeed 

I had not staid so long to tell you all, 

But while I mused came Memory with sad 

eyes, 
Holding the folded annals of my youth ; 
And while I mused. Love with knit brows 

went by, 140 

And with a flying finger swept my lips, 
And spake, ' Be wise : not easily forgiven 
Are those, who setting wide the doors that bar 
The secret bridal chambers of the heart. 
Let in the day.' Here, then, my words have 

end. 24s 

Yet might I tell of meetings, of farewells — 
Of that which came between, more sweet than 

each. 
In whispers, like the whispers of the leaves 
That tremble round a nightingale — in sighs 
Which perfect Joy, perplex'd for utterance, 250 
Stole from her sister Sorrow. Might I not tell 
Of difference, reconcilement, pledges given. 
And vows, where there was never need of 

vows. 
And kisses, where the heart on one wild leap 
Hung tranced from all pulsation, as above 2,55 

The heavens between their fairy fleeces pale 
Sow'd all their mystic gulfs with fleeting stars; 



SDora 97 

Or while the balmy glooming, crescent-lit, 
Spread the light haze along the river-shores, 
And in the hollows ; or as once we met 260 

Unheedful, tho' beneath a whispering rain 
Night slid down one long stream of sighing 

wind, 
And in her bosom bore the baby. Sleep. 

But this whole hour your eyes have been intent 
On that veil'd picture — veil'd, for what it holds 265 
May not be dwelt on by the common day. 
This prelude has prepared thee. Raise thy soul ; 
Make thine heart ready with thine eyes : the time 
Is come to raise the veil. 

Behold her there, 
As I beheld her ere she knew my heart, 270 

My first, last love ; the idol of my youth, 
The darling of my manhood, and, alas ! 
Now the most blessed memory of mine age. 



DORA 

With farmer Allan at the farm abode 
William and Dora. William was his son. 
And she his niece. He often look'd at them, 
And often thought, ' I '11 make them man and 
wife.' 



98 S)elect ^otm& of arntn^0on 

Now Dora felt her uncle's will in all, 5 

And yearn'd toward William ; but the youth, 

because 
He had been always with her in the house, 
Thought not of Dora. 

Then there came a day 
When Allan called his son, and said, ' My son : 
I married late, but I would wish to see '° 

My grandchild on my knees before I die : 
And I have set my heart upon a match. 
Now therefore look to Dora ; she is well 
To look to ; thrifty too beyond her age. 
She is my brother's daughter: he and I 15 

Had once hard words, and parted, and he died 
In foreign lands ; but for his sake I bred 
His daughter Dora : take her for your wife ; 
For I have wish'd this marriage, night and day. 
For many years.' But William answer'd short ; ao 
' I cannot marry Dora ; by my life, 
I will not marry Dora.' Then the old man 
Was wroth, and doubled up his hands, and 

said : 
' You will not, boy ! you dare to answer thus ! 
But in my time a father's word was law, as 

And so it shall be now for me. Look to it ; 
Consider, William : take a month to think, 
And let me have an answer to my wish ; 



SDora 99 

Or, by the Lord that made me, you shall pack, 
And never more darken my doors again.* 30 

But William answer'd madly ; bit his lips. 
And broke away. The more he look'd at her 
The less he liked her ; and his ways were harsh ; 
But Dora bore them meekly. Then before 
The month was out he left his father's house, 35 
And hired himself to work within the fields ; 
And half in love, half spite, he woo'd and wed 
A labourer's daughter, Mary Morrison. 

Then, when the bells were ringing, Allan 
call'd 
His niece and said : ' My girl, I love you well ; 4° 
But if you with him that was my son. 
Or change a word with her he calls his wife. 
My home is none of yours. My will is law.' 
And Dora promised, being meek. She thought, 
' It cannot be : my uncle's mind will change ! ' 45 

And days went on, and there was born a boy 
To William ; then distresses came on him ; 
And day by day he pass'd his father's gate. 
Heart-broken, and his father help'd him not. 
But Dora stored what little she could save, 50 

And sent it them by stealth, nor did they know 
Who sent it ; till at last a fever seized 
On William, and in harvest time he died. 



100 g)elect poemsf of ®enn^0on 

Then Dora went to Mary. Mary sat 
And look'd with tears upon her boy, and 

thought 55 

Hard things of Dora. Dora came and said : 

' I have obeyed my uncle until now, 
And I have sinn'd, for it was all thro' me 
This evil came on William at the first. 
But, Mary, for the sake of him that 's gone, 60 

And for your sake, the woman that he chose, 
And for this orphan, I am come to you : 
You know there has not been for these five 

years 
So full a harvest : let me take the boy. 
And I will set him in my uncle's eye 65 

Among the wheat j that when his heart is glad 
Of the full harvest, he may see the boy. 
And bless him for the sake of him that 's gone.' 

And Dora took the child, and went her way 
Across the wheat, and sat upon a mound 70 

That was unsown, where many poppies grew. 
Far ofF the farmer came into the field 
And spied her not ; for none of all his men 
Dare tell him Dora waited with the child ; 
And Dora would have risen and gone to him, 75 
But her heart fail'd her j and the reapers 

reap'd 
And the sun fell, and all the land was dark. 



SDora loi 

But when the morrow came, she rose and took 
The child once more, and sat upon the mound ; 
And made a little wreath of all the flowers 80 

That grew about, and tied it round his hat 
To make him pleasing in her uncle's eye. 
Then when the farmer pass'd into the field 
He spied her, and he left his men at work. 
And came and said : ' Where were you yester- 
day ? 85 
Whose child is that ? What are you doing here ? ' 
So Dora cast her eyes upon the ground. 
And answer'd softly,' This is William's child ! ' 
' And did I not,' said Allan, ' did I not 
Forbid you, Dora ? ' Dora said again : 90 
' Do with me as you will, but take the child. 
And bless him for the sake of him that 's gone ! ' 
And Allan said, ' I see it is a trick 
Got up betwixt you and the woman there. 
I must be taught my duty, and by you ! 95 
You knew my word was law, and yet you dared 
To slight it. Well — for I will take the boy ; 
But go you hence, and never see me more.' 

So saying, he took the boy that cried aloud 
And struggled hard. The wreath of flowers fell 100 
At Dora's feet. She bow'd upon her hands. 
And the boy's cry came to her from the field. 
More and more distant. She bow'd down her head, 



102 g>elrtt ^oemsf of ®enn^0on 

Remembering the day when first she came, 
And all the things that had been. She bow'd 

down 105 

And wept in secret ; and the reapers reap'd, 
And the sun fell, and all the land was dark. 

Then Dora went to Mary's house, and stood 
Upon the threshold. Mary saw the boy 
Was not with Dora. She broke out in praise no 
To God, that help'd her in her widowhood. 
And Dora said, ' My uncle took the boy ; 
But, Mary, let me live and work with you : 
He says that he will never see me more.* 
Then answer'd Mary, 'This shall never be, 115 
That thou shouldst take my trouble on thyself: 
And, now I think, he shall not have the boy. 
For he will teach him hardness, and to slight 
His mother ; therefore thou and I will go. 
And I will have my boy, and bring him home; 120 
And I will beg of him to take thee back : 
But if he will not take thee back again. 
Then thou and I will live within one house, 
And work for William's child, until he grows 
Of age to help us.' 

So the women kiss'd 125 

Each other, and set out, and reach'd the farm. 
The door was off the latch : they peep'd, and saw 



SDora 103 

The boy set up betwixt his grandsire*s knees, 
Who thrust him in the hollows of his arm, 
And clapt him on the hands and on the cheeks, 130 
Like one that loved him : and the lad stretch'd 

out 
And babbled for the golden seal, that hung 
From Allan's watch, and sparkled by the fire. 
Then they came in : but when the boy beheld 
His mother, he cried out to come to her: 135 

And Allan set him down, and Mary said : 

' O Father ! — if you let me call you so — 
I never came a-begging for myself. 
Or William, or this child ; but now I come 
For Dora : take her back ; she loves you well. 140 

Sir, when William died, he died at peace 
With all men ; for I ask'd him, and he said. 
He could not ever rue his marrying me — 

1 had been a patient wife : but. Sir, he said 
That he was wrong to cross his father thus : 145 
" God bless him ! " he said, " and may he never 

know 
The troubles I have gone thro' ! " Then he 

turn'd 
His face and pass'd — unhappy that I am ! 
But now. Sir, let me have my boy, for you 
Will make him hard, and he will learn to slight 150 
His father's memory ; and take Dora back. 
And let all this be as it was before.' 



1 04 §)rtect ponns; of Wmn^^on 

So Mary said, and Dora hid her face 
By Mary. There was silence in the room ; 
And all at once the old man burst in sobs : — 155 

' I have been to blame — to blame. I have 
kill'd my son. 
I have kill'd him — butllovedhim — my dear son. 
May God forgive me ! — I have been to blame. 
Kiss me, my children.' 

Then they clung about 
The old man's neck, and kiss'd him many times. 160 
And all the man was broken with remorse ; 
And all his love came back a hundredfold ; 
And for three hours he sobb'd o'er William's child 
Thinking of William. 

So those four abode 
Within one house together ; and as years 165 

Went forward, Mary took another mate ; 
But Dora lived unmarried till her death. 



ULYSSES 

It little profits that an idle king. 
By this still hearth, among these barren crags, 
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole 
Unequal laws unto a savage race, 



tmi^sififeflf 105 

That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not 

me. 5 

I cannot rest from travel : I will drink 
Life to the lees : all times I have enjoyM 
Greatly, have sufFer'd greatly, both with those 
That loved me, and alone ; on shore, and when 
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades 10 

Vext the dim sea : I am become a name ; 
For always roaming with a hungry heart 
Much have I seen and known ; cities of men 
And manners, climates, councils, governments, 
Myself not least, but honoured of them all ; '5 

And drunk delight of battle with my peers, 
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. 
I am a part of all that I have met ; 
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro* 
Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin 

fades 20 

For ever and for ever when I move. 
How dull it is to pause, to make an end. 
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use ! 
As tho' to breathe were life. Life piled on life 
Were all too little, and of one to me 25 

Little remains : but every hour is saved 
From that eternal silence, something more, 
A bringer of new things ; and vile it were 
For some three suns to store and hoard myself. 
And this gray spirit yearning in desire 30 



io6 Select ^otm& of ®enn^0on 

To follow knowledge, like a sinking star, 
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought. 

This is my son, mine own Telemachus, 
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle — 
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil 3j 

This labour, by slow prudence to make mild 
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees 
Subdue them to the useful and the good. 
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere 
Of common duties, decent not to fail 40 

In offices of tenderness, and pay 
Meet adoration to my household gods. 
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine. 

There lies the port : the vessel pufFs her sail : 
There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners, 45 
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought 

with me — 
That ever with a frolic welcome took 
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed 
Free hearts, free foreheads — you and I are 

old; 
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil ; 50 

Death closes all : but something ere the end, 
Some work of noble note, may yet be done. 
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. 
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks : 



^u agues;' €\}t 107 

The long day wanes : the slow moon climbs : 

the deep 55 

Moans round with many voices. Come, my 

friends, 
*T is not too late to seek a newer world. 
Push off, and sitting well in order smite 
The sounding furrows ; for my purpose holds 
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths 60 

Of all the western stars, until I die. 
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down : 
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, 
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. 
Tho' much is taken, much abides ; and tho* 65 
We are not now that strength which in old 

days 
Moved earth and heaven j that which we are, 

we are ; 
One equal temper of heroic hearts. 
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will 
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. 70 



ST. AGNES' EVE 

Deep on the convent-roof the snows 
Are sparkling to the moon : 

My breath to heaven like vapour goes : 
May my soul follow soon ! 



o8 g)elect |^oem0 of ®enni^0on 

The shadows of the convent-towers 5 

Slant down the snowy sward, 
Still creeping with the creeping hours 

That lead me to my Lord : 
Make Thou my spirit pure and clear 

As are the frosty skies, 10 

Or this first snowdrop of the year 

That in my bosom lies. 

As these white robes are soil'd and dark, 

To yonder shining ground ; 
As this pale taper's earthly spark, 15 

To yonder argent round ; 
So shows my soul before the Lamb, 

My spirit before Thee ; 
So in mine earthly house I am. 

To that I hope to be. 20 

Break up the heavens, O Lord ! and far, 

Thro' all yon starlight keen. 
Draw me, thy bride, a glittering star. 

In raiment white and clean. 

He lifts me to the golden doors ; 25 

The flashes come and go ; 
All heaven bursts her starry floors, 

And strows her lights below. 
And deepens on and up ! the gates 

Roll back, and far within 3° 



&ir ^alaljaD 109 

For me the Heavenly Bridegroom waits, 

To make me pure of sin. 
The sabbaths of Eternity, 

One sabbath deep and wide — 
A light upon the shining sea — 35 

The Bridegroom with his bride ! 

SIR GALAHAD 

My good blade carves the casques of men. 

My tough lance thrusteth sure, 
My strength is as the strength of ten, 

Because my heart is pure. 
The shattering trumpet shrilleth high, 5 

The hard brands shiver on the steel. 
The splinter'd spear-shafts crack and fly. 

The horse and rider reel : 
They reel, they roll in clanging lists. 

And when the tide of combat stands, 10 

Perfume and flowers fall in showers. 

That lightly rain from ladies' hands. 

How sweet are looks that ladies bend 

On whom their favours fall ! 
For them I battle till the end, 15 

To save from shame and thrall : 
But all my heart is drawn above. 

My knees are bow'd in crypt and shrine : 



1 1 o Select ^otm& of ®enn^0on 

I never felt the kiss of love, 

Nor maiden's hand in mine. 20 

More bounteous aspects on me beam, 

Me mightier transports move and thrill ; 
So keep I fair thro' faith and prayer 

A virgin heart in work and will. 

When down the stormy crescent goes, 25 

A light before me swims. 
Between dark stems the forest glows, 

I hear a noise of hymns : 
Then by some secret shrine I ride ; 

I hear a voice, but none are there ; 30 

The stalls are void, the doors are wide, 

The tapers burning fair. 
Fair gleams the snowy altar-cloth, 

The silver vessels sparkle clean, 
The shrill bell rings, the censer swings, 35 

And solemn chaunts resound between. 

Sometimes on lonely mountain-meres 

I find a magic bark; 
I leap on board : no helmsman steers : 

I float till all is dark. 40 

A gentle sound, an awful light ! 

Three angels bear the holy Grail : 
With folded feet, in stoles of white, 

On sleeping wings they sail. 



&it (^alatiaD 1 1 1 

Ah, blessed vision ! blood of God ! 45 

My spirit beats her mortal bars, 
As down dark tides the glory slides, 

And star-like mingles with the stars. 

When on my goodly charger borne 

Thro' dreaming towns I go, 50 

The cock crows ere the Christmas morn, 

The streets are dumb with snow. 
The tempest crackles on the leads. 

And, ringing, springs from brand and mail ; 
But o'er the dark a glory spreads, 55 

And gilds the driving hail. 
I leave the plain, I climb the height ; 

No branchy thicket shelter yields : 
But blessed forms in whistling storms 

Fly o'er waste fens and windy fields. 60 

A maiden knight — to me is given 

Such hope, I know not fear; 
I yearn to breathe the airs of heaven 

That often meet me here. 
I muse on joy that will not cease, 65 

Pure spaces clothed in living beams, 
Pure lilies of eternal peace. 

Whose odours haunt my dreams : 
And, stricken by an angel's hand. 

This mortal armour that I wear, 70 



1 1 2 g)riect ^otma of ®mni?0on 

This weight and size, this heart and eyes, 
Are touch'd, are turn'd to finest air. 

The clouds are broken in the sky, 

And thro' the mountain-walls 
A rolling organ-harmony 75 

Swells up, and shakes and falls. 
Then move the trees, the copses nod, 

Wings flutter, voices hover clear : 
' O just and faithful knight of God ! 

Ride on ! the prize is near.' 80 

So pass I hostel, hall, and grange; 

By bridge and ford, by park and pale, 
All-arm'd I ride, whate'er betide. 

Until I find the holy Grail. 



EDWARD GRAY 

Sweet Emma Moreland of yonder town 
Met me walking on yonder way, 

' And have you lost your heart ? ' she said : 
' And are you married yet, Edward Gray ? * 

Sweet Emma Moreland spoke to me : 
Bitterly weeping I turn'd away : 

' Sweet Emma Moreland, love no more 
Can touch the heart of Edward Gray. 



CotDaru ^ra]? 113 

' Ellen Adair she loved me well, 

Against her father's and mother's will : lo 
To-day I sat for an hour and wept, 

By Ellen's grave, on the windy hill. 

' Shy she was, and I thought her cold ; 

Thought her proud, and fled over the sea; 
Fiird I was with folly and spite, 15 

When Ellen Adair was dying for me. 

' Cruel, cruel the words I said ! 

Cruelly came they back to-day : 
" You 're too slight and fickle," I said, 

" To trouble the heart of Edward Gray." »o 

' There I put my face in the grass — 
Whisper'd, " Listen to my despair; 

I repent me of all I did : 

Speak a little, Ellen Adair ! " 

'Then I took a pencil and wrote 25 

On the mossy stone, as I lay, 
" Here lies the body of Ellen Adair, 

And here the heart of Edward Gray ! " 

' Love may come, and love may go. 

And, fly like a bird, from tree to tree : 30 

But I will love no more, no more. 

Till Ellen Adair come back to me. 



1 14 Select poem0 of ®enn^0on 

' Bitterly wept I over the stone : 

Bitterly weeping I turn'd away : 
There lies the body of Ellen Adair ! 35 

And there the heart of Edward Gray ! ' 



THE LORD OF BURLEIGH 

In her ear he whispers gaily, 

* If my heart by signs can tell, 
Maiden, I have watch'd thee daily, 

And I think thou lov'st me well.* 
She replies, in accents fainter, 5 

'There is none I love like thee.' 
He is but a landscape-painter. 

And a village maiden she. 
He to lips, that fondly falter, 

Presses his without reproof: 10 

Leads her to the village altar, 

And they leave her father's roof. 
' I can make no marriage present : 

Little can I give my wife. 
Love will make our cottage pleasant, 15 

And I love thee more than life.' 
They by parks and lodges going 

See the lordly castles stand : 
Summer woods, about them blowing, 

Made a murmur in the land. ao 



® Ije ilorD of llBurleigt) 1 1 5 

From deep thought himself he rouses, 

Says to her that loves him well, 
' Let us see these handsome houses 

Where the wealthy nobles dwell.' 
So she goes by him attended, %$ 

Hears him lovingly converse, 
Sees whatever fair and splendid 

Lay betwixt his home and hers ; 
Parks with oak and chestnut shady, 

Parks and order'd gardens great, 30 

Ancient homes of lord and lady, 

Built for pleasure and for state. 
All he shows her makes him dearer : 

Evermore she seems to gaze 
On that cottage growing nearer, 35 

Where they twain will spend their days. 
O but she will love him truly ! 

He shall have a cheerful home ; 
She will order all things duly, 

When beneath his roof they come. 40 

Thus her heart rejoices greatly, 

Till a gateway she discerns 
With armorial bearings stately. 

And beneath the gate she turns; 
Sees a mansion more majestic 45 

Than all those she saw before: 
Many a gallant gay domestic 

Bows before him at the door. 



1 1 6 Select |^orm0 of armn^^on 

And they speak in gentle murmur, 

When they answer to his call, 50 

While he treads with footstep firmer, 

Leading on from hall to hall. 
And, while now she wonders blindly, 

Nor the meaning can divine, 
Proudly turns he round and kindly, 55 

' All of this is mine and thine.* 
Here he lives in state and bounty, 

Lord of Burleigh, fair and free, 
Not a lord in all the county 

Is so great a lord as he. 60 

All at once the colour flushes 

Her sweet face from brow to chin : 
As it were with shame she blushes, 

And her spirit changed within. 
Then her countenance all over 65 

Pale again as death did prove : 
But he clasp'd her like a lover. 

And he cheer'd her soul with love. 
So she strove against her weakness, 

Tho' at times her spirit sank : 70 

Shaped her heart with woman's meekness 

To all duties of her rank : 
And a gentle consort made he. 

And her gentle mind was such 
That she grew a noble lady, 75 

And the people loved her much. 



GTlje ilorD of llBurletgl) 1 1 7 

But a trouble weigh'd upon her. 

And perplex'd her, night and morn, 
With the burthen of an honour 

Unto which she was not born. 80 

Faint she grew, and ever fainter, 

And she murmur'd, ' Oh, that he 
Were once more that landscape-painter. 

Which did win my heart from me ! ' 
So she droop'd and droop'd before him, 85 

Fading slowly from his side : 
Three fair children first she bore him. 

Then before her time she died. 
Weeping, weeping late and early. 

Walking up and pacing down, 9° 

Deeply mourn'd the Lord of Burleigh, 

Burleigh-house by Stamford-town. 
And he came to look upon her. 

And he look'd at her and said, 
' Bring the dress and put it on her, 95 

That she wore when she was wed.' 
Then her people, softly treading. 

Bore to earth her body, drest 
In the dress that she was wed in. 

That her spirit might have rest. 100 



1 1 8 g)elect poent0 of tD^enn^sfon 



THE VOYAGE 

I. 
We left behind the painted buoy 

That tosses at the harbour-mouth : 
And madly danced our hearts with joy, 

As fast we fleeted to the South : 
How fresh was every sight and sound 5 

On open main or winding shore ! 
We knew the merry world was round, 

And we might sail for evermore. 

II. 
Warm broke the breeze against the brow, 

Dry sang the tackle, sang the sail : 10 

The Lady's-head upon the prow 

Caught the shrill salt, and sheer'd the gale. 
The broad seas swellM to meet the keel. 

And swept behind : so quick the run. 
We felt the good ship shake and reel, 15 

We seem'd to sail into the Sun ! 

III. 
How oft we saw the Sun retire. 

And burn the threshold of the night. 
Fall from his Ocean-lane of fire, 

And sleep beneath his pillar'd light ! »o 



®tieJ0opge 119 

How oft the purple-skirted robe 

Of twilight slowly downward drawn. 

As thro* the slumber of the globe 
Again we dash'd into the dawn ! 

IV. 

New stars all night above the brim 25 

Of waters lightened into view ; 
They climb'd as quickly, for the rim 

Changed every moment as we flew. 
Far ran the naked moon across 

The houseless ocean's heaving field, 3° 

Or flying shone, the silver boss 

Of her own halo's dusky shield : 

V. 

The peaky islet shifted shapes. 

High towns on hills were dimly seen. 
We past long lines of Northern capes 35 

And dewy Northern meadows green. 
We came to warmer waves, and deep 

Across the boundless east we drove. 
Where those long swells of breaker sweep 

The nutmeg rocks and isles of clove. 40 

VI. 

By peaks that flamed, or, all in shade, 

Gloom'd the low coast and quivering brine 



120 Select |Boem0 of ®enn^0on 

With ashy rains, that spreading made 

Fantastic plume or sable pine; 
. By sands and steaming flats, and floods 45 

Of mighty mouth, we scudded fast, 
And hills and scarlet-mingled woods 

Glow'd for a moment as we past. 

VII. 

O hundred shores of happy climes. 

How swiftly stream'd ye by the bark ! 50 

At times the whole sea burn'd, at times 

With wakes of fire we tore the dark : 
At times a carven craft would shoot 

From havens hid in fairy bowers. 
With naked limbs and flowers and fruit, 55 

But we nor paused for fruits nor flowers. 

VIII. 

For one fair Vision ever fled 

Down the waste waters day and night, 
And still we follow'd where she led. 

In hope to gain upon her flight. 60 

Her face was evermore unseen. 

And fixt upon the far sea-line ; 
But each man murmur'd ' O my Queen, 

I follow till I make thee mine.' 



®tie©opge 121 

IX. 

And now we lost her, now she gleamM 65 

Like Fancy made of golden air, 
Now nearer to the prow she seem'd 

Like Virtue firm, like Knowledge fair, 
Now high on waves that idly burst 

Like Heavenly Hope she crown'd the sea, 70 
And now, the bloodless point reversed. 

She bore the blade of Liberty. 

X. 

And only one among us — him 

We pleased not — he was seldom pleased : 
He saw not^far : his eyes were dim : 75 

But ours he swore were all diseased. 
'A ship of fools,' he shriekM in spite, 

' A ship of fools,' he sneer'd and wept. 
And overboard one stormy night 

He cast his body, and on we swept. 80 

XI. 

And never sail of ours was furl'd. 
Nor anchor dropt at eve or morn ; 

We loved the glories of the world ; 
But laws of nature were our scorn ; 

For blasts would rise and rave and cease, 85 
But whence were those that drove the sail 



122 g>elect |^oem0 of ^ennp^on 

Across the whirlwind's heart of peace, 
And to and thro' the counter-gale ? 

XII. 
Again to colder climes we came, 

For still we follow'd where she led : 90 

Now mate is blind and captain lame 

And half the crew are sick or dead. 
But, blind or lame or sick or sound. 

We follow that which flies before : 
We know the merry world is round, 95 

And we may sail for evermore. 



THE VISION OF SIN 

I. 
I HAD a vision when the night was late : 
A youth came riding toward a palace-gate. 
He rode a horse with wings, that would have 

flown. 
But that his heavy rider kept him down. 
/ And from the palace came a child of sin, 5 

And took him by the curls, and led him in,"\ 
Where sat a company with heated eyes. 
Expecting when a fountain should arise : 
A sleepy light upon their brows and lips — 
As when the sun, a crescent of eclipse, 10 



iB\)t Wi&ion of ^in 1 23 

Dreams over lake and lawn, and isles and 

capes — 
Suffused them, sitting, lymg, languid shapes. 
By heaps of gourds, and skins of wine, and piles 

of grapes. 

II. 

Then methought I heard a mellow sound. 

Gathering up from all the lower ground ; 15 

Narrowing in to where they sat assembled. 

Low voluptuous music winding trembled, 

Wov'n in circles : they that heard it sigh'd, 

Panted hand-in-hand with faces pale. 

Swung themselves, and in low tones replied ; 20 

Till the fountain spouted, showering wide 

Sleet of diamond-drift and pearly hail ; 

Then the music touch'd the gates and died ; 

Rose again from where it seem'd to fail, 

Storm'd in orbs of song, a growing gale ; 25 

Till thronging in and in, to where they waited. 

As 't were a hundred-throated nightingale. 

The strong tempestuous treble throbb'd and 

palpitated ; 
Ran into its giddiest whirl of sound. 
Caught the sparkles, and in circles, jc 

Purple gauzes, golden hazes, liquid mazes, 
Flung the torrent rainbow round : 
Then they started from their places. 



1 24 §)elect ^oem0 of ^mn^&on 

Moved with violence, changed in hue, 

Caught each other with wild grimaces, 35 

Half-invisible to the view. 

Wheeling with precipitate paces 

To the melody, till they flew. 

Hair, and eyes, and limbs, and faces, 

Twisted hard in fierce embraces, 4° 

Like to Furies, like to Graces, 

Dash'd together in blinding dew : 

Till, kill'd with some luxurious agony, 

The nerve-dissolving melody 

Flutter'd headlong from the sky. 45 

III. 
And then I look'd up toward a mountain-tract, 
That girt the region with high clifF and lawn : 
I saw that every morning, far withdrawn 
Beyond the darkness and the cataract, 
God made Himself an awful rose of dawn, 50 

Unheeded : and detaching, fold by fold. 
From those still heights, and, slowly drawing 

near, 
A vapour heavy, hueless, formless, cold. 
Came floating on for many a month and year. 
Unheeded: and I thought I would have spoken, 55 
And warn'd that madman ere it grew too late : 
But, as in dreams, I could not. Mine was 

broken. 



tETlje t^iaion of ^in 1 25 

When that cold vapour touch'd the palace 

gate, 
And linked again. I saw within my head 
A gray and gap-tooth'd man as lean as death, 60 
Who slowly rode across a wither'd heath. 
And lighted at a ruin'd inn, and said : 

IV. 

' Wrinkled ostler, grim and thin ! 

Here is custom come your way j 
Take my brute, and lead him in, 65 

Stuff his ribs with mouldy hay. 

' Bitter barmaid, waning fast ! 

See that sheets are on my bed ; 
What ! the flower of life is past : 

It is long before you wed. 7© 

' Slip-shod waiter, lank and sour, 

At the Dragon on the heath ! 
Let us have a quiet hour. 

Let us hob-and-nob with Death. 

' I am old, but let me drink ; 75 

Bring me spices, bring me wine; 

I remember, when I think, 

That my youth was half divine. 



126 g>rlect poettt0 of ^tnn^^on 

' Wine is good for shrivell'd lips, 

When a blanket wraps the day, 80 

When the rotten woodland drips. 
And the leaf is stamp'd in clay. 

' Sit thee down, and have no shame. 
Cheek by jowl, and knee by knee : 

What care I for any name ? 85 

What for order or degree ? 

' Let me screw thee up a peg : 

Let me loose thy tongue with wine : 

Callest thou that thing a leg ? 

Which is thinnest ? thine or mine ? 90 

' Thou shalt not be saved by works : 

Thou hast been a sinner too : 
Ruin'd trunks on wither'd forks. 

Empty scarecrows, I and you ! 

' Fill the cup, and fill the can : 95 

Have a rouse before the morn : 

Every moment dies a man. 
Every moment one is born. 

' We are men of ruin'd blood ; 

Therefore comes it we are wise. 100 

Fish are we that love the mud. 

Rising to no fancy-flies. 



tIL\)t Wi^ion of &in 1 2 7 

' Name and fame ! to fly sublime 

Thro' the courts, the camps, the schools, 

Is to be the ball of Time, 'oS 

Bandied by the hands of fools. 

' Friendship ! — to be two in one — 

Let the canting liar pack ! 
Well I know, when I am gone, 

How she mouths behind my back. no 

' Virtue ! — to be good and just — 

Every heart, when sifted well. 
Is a clot of warmer dust, 

MIx'd with cunning sparks of hell. 

' O ! we two as well can look 115 

Whited thought and cleanly life 
As the priest, above his book 

Leering at his neighbour's wife. 

' Fill the cup, and fill the can : 

Have a rouse before the morn : »2o 

Every moment dies a man. 

Every moment one is born. 

' Drink, and let the parties rave : 

They are fill'd with idle spleen ; 
Rising, falling, like a wave, 125 

For they know not what they mean. 



128 g)rtect |aoem0 of tKenn^^on 

' He that roars for liberty 

Faster binds a tyrant's power; 
And the tyrant's cruel glee 

Forces on the freer hour. 130 

' Fill the can, and fill the cup : 

All the windy ways of men 
Are but dust that rises up, 

And is lightly laid again. 

' Greet her with applausive breath, 135 

Freedom, gaily doth she tread ; 

In her right a civic wreath. 
In her left a human head. 

' No, I love not what is new ; 

She is of an ancient house : 140 

And I think we knew the hue 

Of that cap upon her brows. 

' Let her go ! her thirst she slakes 
Where the bloody conduit runs. 

Then her sweetest meal she makes 145 

On the first-born of her sons. 

* Drink to lofty hopes that cool — 

Visions of a perfect State : 
Drink we, last, the public fool, 

Frantic love and frantic hate. 150 



tCl^e ^iflfion of S>in 129 

' Chant me now some wicked stave. 

Till thy drooping courage rise, 
And the glow-worm of the grave 

Glimmer in thy rheumy eyes. 

' Fear not thou to loose thy tongue; '55 

Set thy hoary fancies free ; 
What is loathsome to the young 

Savours well to thee and me. 

* Change, reverting to the years. 

When thy nerves could understand i6o 
What there is in loving tears, 

And the warmth of hand in hand. 

* Tell me tales of thy first love — 

April hopes, the fools of chance ; 
Till the graves begin to move, 165 

And the dead begin to dance. 

'Fill the can, and fill the cup: 

All the windy ways of men - 
Are but dust that rises up. 

And is lightly laid again. 170 

' Trooping from their mouldy dens 

The chap-fallen circle spreads : 
Welcome, fellow-citizens, 

Hollow hearts and empty heads ! 



130 g>rlect poem0 of ®mn^0on 

' You are bones, and what of that ? 175 

Every face, however full. 
Padded round with flesh and fat. 

Is but modell'd on a skull. 

* Death is king, and Vivat Rex ! 

Tread a measure on the stones, 180 

Madam — if I know your sex. 

From the fashion of your bones. 

' No, I cannot praise the fire 
In your eye — nor yet your lip : 

All the more do I admire 185 

Joints of cunning workmanship. 

' Lo ! God's likeness — the ground-plan — 
Neither modell'd, glazed, nor framed : 

Buss me, thou rough sketch of man, 

Far too naked to be shamed ! 19° 

' Drink to Fortune, drink to Chance, 
While we keep a little breath ! 

Drink to heavy Ignorance ! 

Hob-and-nob with brother Death ! 

' Thou art mazed, the night is long, 195 

And the longer night is near : 
What ! I am not all as wrong 

As a bitter jest is dear. 



® tie tBiiiion of ^in 1 3 1 

' Youthful hopes, by scores, to all. 

When the locks are crisp and curlM ; aoo 

Unto me my maudlin gall 

And my mockeries of the world. 

' Fill the cup, and fill the can : 
Mingle madness, mingle scorn ! 

Dregs of life, and lees of man : 205 

Yet we will not die forlorn.* 

V. 

The voice grew faint : there came a further 

change : 
Once more uprose the mystic mountain-range : 
Below were men and horses pierced with worms. 
And slowly quickening into lower forms ; 2,10 

By shards and scurf of salt, and scum of dross. 
Old plash of rains, and refuse patched with 

moss. 
Then some one spake : ' Behold ! it was a crime 
Of sense avenged by sense that wore with time.* 
Another said: 'The crime of sense became ^i? 
The crime of malice, and is equal blame.' 
And one : ' He had not wholly quench'd his 

power ; 
A little grain of conscience made him sour.* 
At last I heard a voice upon the slope 
Cry to the summit, ' Is there any hope ? ' aao 



132 Select poem0 of ®mn^0on 

To which an answer peal'd from that high land, 
But in a tongue no man could understand j 
And on the glimmering limit far withdrawn 
God made Himself an awful rose of dawn. 



BREAK, BREAK, BREAK 

Break, break, break. 

On thy cold gray stones, O Sea ! 
And I would that my tongue could utter 

The thoughts that arise in me. 

O well for the fisherman's boy, 5 

That he shouts with his sister at play ! 

O well for the sailor lad. 

That he sings in his boat on the bay ! 

And the stately ships go on 

To their haven under the hill ; 10 

But O for the touch of a vanished hand, 

And the sound of a voice that is still ! 

Break, break, break. 

At the foot of thy crags, O Sea ! 
But the tender grace of a day that is dead 15 

Will never come back to me. 



THE PRINCESS: A MEDLEY. 

1847 



SONGS 

The Falling Out. 

As thro' the land at eve we went. 

And pluckM the ripen'd ears, 
We fell out, my wife and I, 
O we fell out I know not why. 

And klss'd again with tears. 5 

And blessings on the falling out 

That all the more endears, 
When we fall out with those we love 

And kiss again with tears ! 
For when we came where lies the child 10 

We lost in other years, 
There above the little grave, 
O there above the little grave. 

We kiss'd again with tears. 

Lullaby. 

Sweet and low, sweet and low. 
Wind of the western sea, 



1 34 ^tlttt poem0 of ®enn^0on 

Low, low, breathe and blow. 

Wind of the western sea ! 
Over the rolling waters go, 5 

Come from the dying moon, and blow, 

Blow him again to me ; 
While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps. 

Sleep and rest, sleep and rest. 

Father will come to thee soon ; lo 

Rest, rest, on mother's breast. 

Father will come to thee soon ; 
Father will come to his babe in the nest, 
Silver sails all out of the west 

Under the silver moon : '5 

Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep. 

Bugle Song. 

The splendour falls on castle walls 

And snowy summits old in story : 
The long light shakes across the lakes. 
And the wild cataract leaps in glory. 
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, 5 
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying. 

O hark, O hear ! how thin and clear. 
And thinner, clearer, farther going ! 

O sweet and far from clifF and scar 

The horns of Elfland faintly blowing ! ^o 



S^ongfii 135 

Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying : 
Blow, bugle ; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dy- 
ing. 

O love, they die in yon rich sky. 

They faint on hill or field or river : 
Our echoes roll from soul to soul, 15 

And grow for ever and for ever. 
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying. 
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying. 

Idle Tears. 

' Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, 
Tears from the depth of some divine despair. 
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes. 
In looking on the happy Autumn-fields, 
And thinking of the days that are no more. 5 

' Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail. 
That brings our friends up from the underworld, 
Sad as the last which reddens over one 
That sinks with all we love below the verge ; 
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more. 10 

' Ah. sad and strange as in dark summer 
dawns 
The earliest pipe of half-awaken'd birds 
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes 



136 Select |3onn0 of tKenn^^on 

The casement slowly grows a glimmering 

square ; 
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more. 15 

' Dear as remember'd kisses after death, 
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feignM 
On lips that are for others ; deep as love. 
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret ; 
O Death in Life, the days that are no more.' ao 

North and South. 

' O Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying South, 
Fly to her, and fall upon her gilded eaves, 
And tell her, tell her, what I tell to thee. 

' O tell her. Swallow, thou that knowest 
each. 
That bright and fierce and fickle is the South, 5 
And dark and true and tender is the North. 

' O Swallow, Swallow, if I could follow, and 
light 
Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill. 
And cheep and twitter twenty million loves. 

' O were I thou that she might take me in, 10 
And lay me on her bosom, and her heart 
Would rock the snowy cradle till I died. 



^ong0 137 

'Why lingereth she to clothe her heart with 
love, 
Delaying as the tender ash delays 
To clothe herself, when all the woods are green ? 15 

' O tell her, Swallow, that thy brood is flown : 
Say to her, I do but wanton in the South, 
But in the North long since my nest is made. 

' O tell her, brief is life but love is long. 
And brief the sun of summer in the North, »o 

And brief the moon of beauty in the South. 

' O Swallow, flying from the golden woods. 
Fly to her, and pipe and woo her, and make her 

mine, 
And tell her, tell her, that I follow thee.' 

The Call to War, 

Thy voice is heard thro* rolling drums, 

That beat to battle where he stands ; 
Thy face across his fancy comes. 

And gives the battle to his hands : 
A moment, while the trumpets blow, 5 

He sees his brood about thy knee; 
The next, like fire he meets the foe. 

And strikes him dead for thine and thee. 



1 38 ^rlect potrna of ^mn^ion 

The Call to Life. 

Home they brought her warrior dead : 
She nor swoon'd, nor utter'd cry : 

All her maidens, watching, said, 
' She must weep or she will die.' 

Then they praised him, soft and low, 5 

Call'd him worthy to be loved. 
Truest friend and noblest foe ; 

Yet she neither spoke nor moved. 

Stole a maiden from her place. 

Lightly to the warrior stept, 10 

Took the face-cloth from the face ; 

Yet she neither moved nor wept. 

Rose a nurse of ninety years. 

Set his child upon her knee — 
Like summer tempest came her tears — 15 

' Sweet my child, I live for thee.* 



MALE AND FEMALE CREATED 
HE THEM. 

' The woman's cause is man's ; they rise or sink 
Together, dwarf 'd or godlike, bond or free : 
For she that out of Lethe scales with man 



^ale anu ifemale 139 

The shining steps of Nature, shares with man 
His nights, his days, moves with him to one 

goal, 5 

Stays all this fair young planet in her hands — 
If she be small, slight-natured, miserable. 
How shall men grow ? but work no more 

alone ! 
Our place is much : as far as in us lies 
We two will serve them both in aiding her — lo 
Will clear away the parasitic forms 
That seem to keep her up but drag her down — 
Will leave her space to burgeon out of all 
Within her — let her make herself her own 
To give or keep, to live and learn and be 15 

All that not harms distinctive womanhood. 
For woman is not undevelopt man. 
But diverse : could we make her as the man, 
Sweet Love were slain : his dearest bond is this, 
Not like to like, but like in difference. ao 

Yet in the long years liker must they grow ; 
The man be more of woman, she of man ; 
He gain in sweetness and in moral height. 
Nor lose the wrestling thews that throw the 

world ; 
She mental breadth, nor fail in childward care, 25 
Nor lose the childlike in the larger mind ; 
Till at the last she set herself to man. 
Like perfect music unto noble words ; 



140 Select poentfl? of tETenn^^on 

And so these twain, upon the skirts of Time, 
Sit side by side, full-summ'd in all their powers, 3° 
Dispensing harvest, sowing the To-be, 
Self-reverent each and reverencing each, 
Distinct in individualities. 
But like each other ev'n as those who love. 
Then comes the statelier Eden back to men : 35 
Then reign the world's great bridals, chaste and 

calm : 
Then springs the crowning race of humankind. 
May these things be ! ' 

Sighing she spoke ' I fear 
They will not.' 

' Dear, but let us type them now 
In our own lives, and this proud watchword 

rest 40 

Of equal ; seeing either sex alone 
Is half itself, and in true marriage lies 
Nor equal, nor unequal : each fulfils 
Defect in each, and always thought in thought. 
Purpose in purpose, will in will, they grow, 45 
The single pure and perfect animal. 
The two-cell'd heart beating, with one full 

stroke, 
Life.' 

And again sighing she spoke : ' A dream 
That once was mine ! what woman taught you 

this ? ' 



^ale anu ifemale 141 

' Alone,* I said, ' from earlier than I know, 50 
Immersed in rich foreshadowings of the world, 
I loved the woman : he, that doth not, lives 
A drowning life, besotted in sweet self, 
Or pines in sad experience worse than death. 
Or keeps his wing'd affections dipt with crime : 55 
Yet was there one thro* whom I loved her, one 
Not learned, save in gracious household ways, 
Not perfect, nay, but full of tender wants. 
No Angel, but a dearer being, all dipt 
In Angel instincts, breathing Paradise, 60 

Interpreter between the Gods and men. 
Who look'd all native to her place, and yet 
On tiptoe seem*d to touch upon a sphere 
Too gross to tread, and all male minds perforce 
Sway'd to her from their orbits as they moved, 65 
And girdled her with music. Happy he 
With such a mother ! faith in womankind 
Beats with his blood, and trust in all things high 
Comes easy to him, and tho* he trip and fall 
He shall not blind his soul with clay.* 7© 

The Princess^ VII. 



ODE ON THE DEATH OF THE 
DUKE OF WELLINGTON 

1852 
I. 

Bury the Great Duke 

With an empire's lamentation, 
Let us bury the Great Duke 

To the noise of the mourning of a mighty 
nation, 
Mourning when their leaders fall, 5 

Warriors carry the warrior's pall. 
And sorrow darkens hamlet and hall. 

II. 
Where shall we lay the man whom we deplore ? 
Here, in streaming London's central roar. 
Let the sound of those he wrought for, 10 

And the feet of those he fought for, 
Echo round his bones for evermore. 

I, 1852, 1853 : Let us bury, etc. 
5, 6. 1852: 

When laurel-garlanded leaders fall. 
And warriors, etc. 

9. In 1852, not present ; in 1853, two lines : 

He died on Walmer's lonely shore. 
But here, etc. 



4^ae on t\)t SDeatJi of Wellington hs 

III. 

Lead out the pageant : sad and slow, 

As fits an universal woe, 

Let the long long procession go, '5 

And let the sorrowing crowd about it grow, 

And let the mournful martial music blow ; 

The last great Englishman is low. 

IV. 

Mourn, for to us he seems the last. 

Remembering all his greatness in the Past. »o 

No more in soldier fashion will he greet 

With lifted hand the gazer in the street, 

O friends, our chief state-oracle is mute : 

Mourn for the man of long-enduring blood. 

The statesman-warrior, moderate, resolute, n^ »5 

Whole in himself, a common good. 

Mourn for the man of amplest influence, 

Yet clearest of ambitious crime. 

Our greatest yet with least pretence. 

Great in council and great in war, / 30 

Foremost captain of his time. 

Rich in saving common-sense. 

And, as the greatest only are. 

In his simplicity sublime. 

20. 1852 : Our sorrow draws but on the golden Past. 

27. 1852: largest Infiuencc, 

28. 1852 : freest from ambitious 



144 Select potms of tE^mn^^on 

O good gray head which all men knew, 35 

O voice from which their omens all men drew, 
O iron nerve to true occasion true, 
O faH'n at length that tower of strength 
Which stood four-square to all the winds that 

blew ! 
Such was he whom we deplore. 4° 

The long self-sacrifice of life is o'er. 
The great World-victor's victor will be seen no 

more. 

V. 

All is over and done : 

Render thanks to the Giver, 

England, for thy son. 45 

Let the bell be toll'd. 

Render thanks to the Giver, 

And render him to the mould. 

Under the cross of gold 

That shines over city and river, 50 

There he shall rest for ever 

Among the wise and the bold. 

Let the bell be toll'd : 

And a reverent people behold 

The towering car, the sable steeds : 55 

Bright let it be with its blazon'd deeds, 

Dark in its funeral fold. 

56. 1852-1855 : his blazon'd, etc. 



OlDe on t^r SDrat^ of Wellington 145 

Let the bell be toll'd : 

And a deeper knell in the heart be knoU'd ; 

And the sound of the sorrowing anthem roll'd 60 

Thro' the dome of the golden cross ; 

And the volleying cannon thunder his loss ; 

He knew their voices of old. 

For many a time in many a clime 

His captain's-ear has heard them boom 65 

Bellowing victory, bellowing doom : 

When he with those deep voices wrought, 

Guarding realms and kings from shame ; 

With those deep voices our dead captain taught 

The tyrant, and asserts his claim 7® 

In that dread sound to the great name, 

Which he has worn so pure of blame, 

In praise and in dispraise the same, 

A man of well-attemper'd frame. 

O civic muse, to such a name, 75 

To such a name for ages long. 

To such a name. 

Preserve a broad approach of fame. 

And ever-echoing avenues of song. 

VI. 

Who is he that cometh like an honoured guest, 80 
With banner and with music, with soldier and 
with priest, 

59. Added in 1853. ^n</ inserted in 1855. 
79. 185 2- 1855. ever-ringing avenues, etc. 



146 Select J^onns of (Emn^sion 

With a nation weeping, and breaking on my 

rest ? 
Mighty Seaman, this is he 
Was great by land as thou by sea. 
Thine island loves thee well, thou famous man, 85 
The greatest sailor since our world began. 
Now, to the roll of muffled drums. 
To thee the greatest soldier comes ; 
For this is he 

Was great by land as thou by sea; 90 

His foes were thine ; he kept us free ; 
O give him welcome, this is he 
Worthy of our gorgeous rites. 
And worthy to be laid by thee ; 
For this is England's greatest son, 95 

He that gain'd a hundred fights, 
Nor ever lost an English gun ; 
91-113. 1855: 

His martial wisdom kept us free ; 
O warrior-seaman, this is he, 
This is England's greatest son. 
Worthy of our gorgeous rites. 
And worthy to be laid by thee; 
He that gain'd a hundred fights. 
And never lost an English gun ; 
He that in his later day 
Against the myriads of Assaye 
Clash'd with his fiery few and won ; 
And underneath another sun 
Made the soldier, led Mm on. 
And ever great and greater grew. 
Beating from the wasted vines 
All their marshals' bandit swarms 
Back to France with countless blows j 
Till their host of eagles flew 
Past the Pyrenean pines, etc. 



^Dr on t\)t 2Deatl) of Wellington 147 

This is he that far away 

Against the myriads of Assaye 

Class'd with his fiery few and won j loo 

And underneath another sun, 

Warring on a later day, 

Round affrighted Lisbon drew 

The treble works, the vast designs 

Of his labour'd rampart-lines, 105 

Where he greatly stood at bay. 

Whence he issued forth anew. 

And ever great and greater grew, 

Beating from the wasted vines 

Back to France her banded swarms, no 

Back to France with countless blows. 

Till o'er the hills her eagles flew 

Beyond the Pyrenean pines, 

Follow'd up in valley and glen 

With blare of bugle, clamour of men, 115 

Roll of cannon and clash of arms. 

And England pouring on her foes. 

Such a war had such a close. 

Again their ravening eagle rose 

In anger, wheel'd on Europe-shadowing wings, 120 

And barking for the thrones of kings ; 

Till one that sought but Duty's iron crown 

On that loud sabbath shook the spoiler down ; 

A day of onsets of despair ! 

loi. 1852: a nearer sun, 113. 1855: Past the etc 



148 Select l^oemsf of ©enn^^on 

Dash'd on every rocky square 125 

Their surging charges foam'd themselves away; 
Last, the Prussian trumpet blew j 
Thro' the long-tormented air 
Heaven flash'd a sudden jubilant ray, 
And down we swept and charged and over- 
threw. 130 
So great a soldier taught us there. 
What long-enduring hearts could do 
In that world-earthquake, Waterloo ! 
Mighty Seaman, tender and true, 
And pure as he from taint of craven guile, 135 
O saviour of the silver-coasted isle, 
O shaker of the Baltic and the Nile, 
If aught of things that here befall 
Touch a spirit among things divine. 
If love of country move thee there at all, 140 
Be glad, because his bones are laid by thine ! 
And thro* the centuries let a people's voice 
In full acclaim, 
A people's voice. 

The proof and echo of all human fame, 145 

A people's voice, when they rejoice 
At civic revel and pomp and game, 
Attest their great commander's claim 
With honour, honour, honour, honour to him, 
Eternal honour to his name. 150 

133. Till 1875, world's earthquake. 



^r>t on t\)t SDeatj) of OTrUington 149 

VII. 

A people's voice ! we are a people yet. 
Tho' all men else their nobler dreams forget, 
Confused by brainless mobs and lawless Powers ; 
Thank Him who isled us here, and roughly set 
His Briton in blown seas and storming showers, 155 
We have a voice, with which to pay the debt 
Of boundless love and reverence and regret 
To those great men who fought, and kept it 

ours. 
And keep it ours, O God, from brute control ; 
O Statesmen, guard us, guard the eye, the soul 160 
Of Europe, keep our noble England whole. 
And save the one true seed of freedom sown 
Betwixt a people and their ancient throne. 
That sober freedom out of which there springs 
Our loyal passion for our temperate kings ; 165 
For, saving that, ye help to save mankind 
Till public wrong be crumbled into dust, 
And drill the raw world for the march of mind. 
Till crowds at length be sane and crowns be 

just. 

I54> 155' Added in 1853 : 1853 and 1855, His Saxon 
157. 1852: Of most unbounded reverence and regret 

1853 : Of boundless reverence and regret 
159. Added in 1853. 
166. 1852 : For, saving that, ye save mankind 

168. 1852 : And help the march of human mind 

169. 1852 : Till crowds be sane and crowns be just. 



ISO Select l^oemsf of tH^mn^&on 

But wink no more in slothful overtrust. 170 

Remember him who led your hosts ; 

He bad you guard the sacred coasts. 

Your cannons moulder on the seaward wall ; 

His voice is silent in your council-hall 

For ever ; and whatever tempests lour '75 

For ever silent ; even if they broke 

In thunder, silent ; yet remember all 

He spoke among you and the Man who spoke ; 

Who never sold the truth to serve the hour, 

Nor palter'd with Eternal God for power; 180 

Who let the turbid streams of rumour flow 

Thro' either babbling world of high and low ; 

Whose life was work, whose language rife 

With rugged maxims hewn from life ; 

Who never spoke against a foe; 185 

Whose eighty winters freeze with one rebuke 

All great self-seekers trampling on the right : 

Truth-teller was our England's Alfred named ; 

170. 1852 : These lines followed : 

Perchance our greatness will increase j 
Perchance a darkening future yields 
Some reverse from worse to worse. 
The blood of men in quiet fields. 
And sprinkled on the sheaves of peace. 

171. 185a : And O remember 

172. 1852 : Respect his sacred warning ; guard your coasts : 
1853 : Revere his warning : guard your coasts. 

173. Added in 1853. 181,182. Added in 1855. 
183, 184. Added in 1853. 185. Added in 1855. 
186. 1852: His eighty etc. 



d^oe on t\)t SDeatt) of Wellington 1 5 1 

Truth-lover was our English Duke; 

Whatever record leap to light >9o 

He never shall be shamed. 

VIII. 
Lo, the leader in these glorious wars 
Now to glorious burial slowly borne, 
Follow'd by the brave of other lands, 
He, on whom from both her open hands '95 

Lavish Honour shower'd all her stars. 
And affluent Fortune emptied all her horn. 
Yea, let all good things await 
Him who cares not to be great. 
But as he saves or serves the state. *oo 

Not once or twice in our rough island-story, 
The path of duty was the way to glory : 
He that walks it, only thirsting 
For the right, and learns to deaden 
Love of self, before his journey closes, aoS 

He shall find the stubborn thistle bursting 
Into glossy purples, which outredden 
All voluptuous garden-roses. 
Not once or twice in our fair island-story. 
The path of duty was the way to glory : 210 

He, that ever following her commands, 
On with toil of heart and knees and hands, , 
Thro' the long gorge to the far light has won 
His path upward, and prevail'd. 



1 5 2 Select pontic of ®ntn^0on 

Shall find the toppling crags of Duty scaled 115 

Are close upon the shining table-lands 

To which our God Himself is moon and sun. 

Such was he : his work is done. 

But while the races of mankind endure, 

Let his great example stand »io 

Colossal, seen of every land. 

And keep the soldier firm, the statesman pure : 

Till in all lands and thro' all human story 

The path of duty be the way to glory : 

And let the land whose hearths he saved from 

shame 115 

For many and many an age proclaim 
At civic revel and pomp and game. 
And when the long-illumined cities flame, 
Their ever-loyal iron leader's fame. 
With honour, honour, honour, honour to him. 130 
Eternal honour to his name. 

rx. 
Peace, his triumph will be sung 
By some yet unmoulded tongue 
Far on in summers that we shall not see : 
Peace, it is a day of pain a35 

For one about whose patriarchal knee 

218-226. 1852: 

He has not fail'd: he hath prevail'd : 

So let the men whose hearths he saved from shame 

Thro' many and many an age proclaim 



(DDe on t^e 2r>eatt) of MelUngton 153 

Late the little children clung : 

O peace, it is a day of pain 

For one, upon whose hand and heart and brain 

Once the weight and fate of Europe hung. 240 

Ours the pain, be his the gain ! 

More than is of man's degree 

Must be with us, watching here 

At this, our great solemnity. 

Whom we see not we revere ; «45 

We revere, and we refrain 

From talk of battles loud and vain, 

And brawling memories all too free 

For such a wise humility 

As befits a solemn fane : ^S^ 

We revere, and while we hear 

The tides of Music's golden sea 

Setting toward eternity. 

Uplifted high in heart and hope are we. 

Until we doubt not that for one so true »55 

There must be other nobler work to do 

Than when he fought at Waterloo, 

And Victor he must ever be. 

For tho' the Giant Ages heave the hill 

241. Added In 1853. 
251-Z55. 1852 : 

For solemn, too, this day arc we. 

O friends, we doubt not that for one so truc^ 

254- 1853: 

Lifted up in heart are we. 
259-261. Added in 1853. 



1 54 Select poentfii of tE^mn^son 

And break the shore, and evermore 260 

Make and break, and work their will; 
Tho' world on world in myriad myriads roll 
Round us, each with different powers, 
And other forms of life than ours, 
What know we greater than the soul ? 165 

On God and Godlike men we build our trust. 
Hush, the Dead March wails in the people's 

ears : 
The dark crowd moves, and there are sobs and 

tears : 
The black earth yawns : the mortal disappears ; 
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust ; 270 

He is gone who seem'd so great. — 
Gone ; but nothing can bereave him 
Of the force he made his own 
Being here, and we believe him 
Something far advanced in State, 275 

And that he wears a truer crown 
Than any wreath that man can weave him. 
Speak no more of his renown. 
Lay your earthly fancies down. 
And in the vast cathedral leave him. 280 

God accept him, Christ receive him. 

262. 1852-1855 : worlds on worlds 

266-270. Added in 1853. 267. 1853 : March sounds 

271. 1852: Themaa 278. 1852-1853 : But speak 



iliortljem jfarmer 155 

NORTHERN FARMER. 

OLD STYLE. 
L 

Wheer *ast a bean saw long and mea Hggin' 
'ere aloan ? 

Noorse ? thourt nowt o* a noorse : whoy, Doc- 
tor 's abean an* agoan : 

Says that I moant *a naw moor aale : but I 
beant a fool : 

Git ma my aale, fur I beant a-gawin* to break 
my rule. 

II. 

Doctors, they knaws nowt, fur a says what 's 

nawways true : 5 

Naw soort o* koind o' use to saay the things that 

a do. 
I 've 'ed my point o' aale ivry noight sin* I 

bean 'ere. 
An* I*ve *ed my quart ivry market-noight for 

foorty year. 

III. 
Parson 's a bean loikewoise, an' a sittin' 'ere o' 

my bed. 
' The amoighty 's a taakin o' you to 'issen, my 

friend, a said, 10 

10. ou as in hour. 



156 g^elect poenttf of ^tnn^&on 

An* a towd ma my sins, an 's toithe were due, 

an' I gied it in bond ; 
I done moy duty boy 'um, as I 'a done boy the 

lond. 

IV. 
LarnM a ma' bea. I reckons I 'annot sa mooch 

to larn. 
But a cast oop, thot a did, 'bout Bessy Marris's 

barne. 
Thaw a knaws I hallus voated wi' Squire an* 

choorch an' staate, 15 

An' i' the woost o' toimes I wur niver agin 

the raate. 

V. 
An* I hallus coom'd to *s choorch afoor moy 

Sally wur dead. 
An' 'eard 'um a bummin' awaay loike a buzzard* 

clock ower my 'ead, 
An' I niver knaw'd whot a mean'd but I thowt 

a 'ad summut to saay, 
An' I thowt a said whot a owt to 'a said an' I 
coom'd awaay. ao 

VI. 

Bessy Marris's barne ! tha knaws she laaid it to 

mea. 
Mowt a bean, mayhap, for she wur a bad un, 

shea. 

18. Cockchafer. 



j^ortljem iFarmer 157 

*Siver, I kep' um, I kep' um, my lass, tha mun 

understond ; 
I done moy duty boy um as I *a done boy the lond. 

VII. 

But Parson a cooms an' a goas, an' a says it 

easy an' freea 25 

' The amoighty 's a taakin o' you to 'issen, my 

friend,' says 'ea. 
I weant saay men be loiars, thaw summun said 

it in 'aaste : 
But 'e reads wonn sarmin a weeak, an' I 'a 

stubb'd Thurnaby waaste. 

VIII. 
D' ya moind the waaste, my lass ? naw, naw, 

tha was not born then ; 
Theer wur a boggle in it, I often 'eard 'um mysen ; 30 
Moast loike a butter-bump, fur I 'eard 'um about 

an' about. 
But I stubb'd 'um oop wi' the lot, an' raaved 

an' rembled 'um out. 

IX. 
Keaper's it wur ; fo' they fun' um theer a-laaid 

of 'is faace. 
Down i' the woild 'enemies afoor I coom*d to 

the plaace. 

31. Bittern. 34. Anemones. 



158 Select poem0 of ^tnn^ion 

Noaks or Thimbleby — toaner *ed shot *um as 

dead as a naail. 35 

Noaks wur 'ang'd for it oop at 'soize — but 
git ma my aale. 

X. 

Dubbut loook at the waaste : theer warn't not 

feead for a cow ; 
Nowt at all but bracken an' fuzz, an' loook at 

it now — 
Warnt worth nowt a haacre, an' now theer 's lots 

of feead, 
Fourscoor yows upon it an' some on it down 

i' seead. 4© 

XI. 

Nobbut a bit on it *s left, an' I mean'd to 'a 

stubb'd it at fall. 
Done it ta-year I mean'd, an' runn'd plow thrufF 

it an' all. 
If godamoighty an' parson 'ud nobbut let ma aloan, 
Mea, wi' haate hoonderd haacre o' Squoire's, an' 

lond o' my oan. 

XIL 

Do godamoighty knaw what a 's doing a-taakin* 

6' mea ? 45 

I beant wonn as saws 'ere a bean an' yonder a 
pea; 

35. One or other. 40. ou as in hour. 40. Clover. 



jporeliem jFarmer 159 

An' Squoire 'uU be sa mad an' all — a' dear a' dear ! 
And I 'a managed for Squoire coom Michaelmas 
thutty year. 

XIII. 
A mowt *a taaen owd Joanes, as' ant not a 

'aapoth o' sense, 
Or a mowt 'a taaen young Robins — a niver 

mended a fence: 5° 

But godamoighty a moost taake mea an' taake 

ma now 
Wi* aaf the cows to cauve an' Thurnaby 

hoalms to plow ! 

XIV. 
Loook 'ow quoloty smoiles when they seeas ma 

a passin' boy, 
Says to thessen naw doubt ' what a man a bea 

sewer-loy ! ' 
Fur they knaws what I bean to Squoire sin fust 

a coom'd to the 'All ; 55 

I done moy duty by Squoire an' I done moy 

duty boy hall. 

XV. 

Squoire 's i' Lunnon, an' summun I reckons 'ull 

'a to wroite. 
For whoa 's to howd the lond ater mea thot 

muddles ma quoit ^ 



i6o ^tktt J3oem0 of tETmn^^on 

Sartin-sewer I bea, thot a weant niver give it to 

Joanes, 
Naw, nor a moant to Robins — a niver rembles 

the stoans. 60 

XVL 

But summun *ull come ater mea mayhap wi* 'is 

kittle o' steam 
Huzzin' an' maazin' the blessed fealds wi' the 

Divil's oan team. 
Sin' I mun doy I mun doy, thaw loife they says 

is sweet. 
But sin' I mun doy I mun doy, for I couldn 

abear to see it. 

XVII. 
What atta stannin' theer fur, an' doesn bring ma 

the aale ? 65 

Doctor 's a 'toattler, lass, an' a 's hallus i' the 

owd taale ; 
I weant break rules fur Doctor, a knaws naw 

moor nor a floy ; 
Git ma my aale I tell tha, an' if I mun doy I 

mun doy. 



turtle S[>ai0^ i6i 

THE DAISY. 

WRITTEN AT EDINBURGH. 

O Love, what hours were thine and mine, 
In lands of palm and southern pine ; 

In lands of palm, of orange-blossom, 
Of olive, aloe, and maize and vine. 

What Roman strength Turbia show'd 5 

In ruin, by the mountain road; 

How like a gem, beneath, the city 
Of little Monaco, basking, glow'd. 

How richly down the rocky dell 

The torrent vineyard streaming fell i© 

To meet the sun and sunny waters. 
That only heaved with a summer swell. 

What slender campanili grew 

By bays, the peacock's neck in hue; 

Where, here and there, on sandy beaches 15 
A milky-beird amaryllis blew. 

How young Columbus seem'd to rove, 
Yet present in his natal grove. 

Now watching high on mountain cornice, 
And steering, now, from a purple cove, ao 



1 62 g)eUct |^oem0 of ®mn^0on 

Now pacing mute by ocean's rim ; 
Till, in a narrow street and dim, 

I stayM the wheels at Cogoletto, 
And drank, and loyally drank to him. 

Nor knew we well what pleased us most, 25 
Not the dipt palm of which they boast j 

But distant colour, happy hamlet, 
A moulder'd citadel on the coast. 

Or tower, or high hill-convent, seen 

A light amid its olives green ; 30 

Or olive-hoary cape in ocean ; 
Or rosy blossom in hot ravine. 

Where oleanders flush'd the bed 
Of silent torrents, gravel-spread ; 

And, crossing, oft we saw the glisten 35 
Of ice, far up on a mountain head. 

We loved that hall, tho' white and cold, 
Those niched shapes of noble mould, 
A princely people's awful princes, 
The grave, severe Genovese of old. 40 

At Florence too what golden hours, 
In those long galleries, were ours j 

What drives about the fresh Cascine, 
Or walks in Boboli's ducal bowers. 



QT^ie 2Dai0^ 163 

In bright vignettes, and each complete, 45 

Of tower or duomo, sunny-sweet. 

Or palace, how the city glitter'd, 
Thro* cypress avenues, at our feet. 

But when we crost the Lombard plain 
Remember what a plague of rain ; 50 

Of rain at Reggio, rain at Parma ; 
At Lodi, rain, Piacenza, rain. 

And stern and sad (so rare the smiles 
Of sunlight) look'd the Lombard piles ; 

Porch-pillars on the lion resting, 55 

And sombre, old, colonnaded aisles. 

Milan, O the chanting quires, 
The giant windows' blazon'd fires. 

The height, the space, the gloom, the glory ! 
A mount of marble, a hundred spires ! 60 

1 climb'd the roofs at break of day ; 
Sun-smitten Alps before me lay. 

I stood among the silent statues, 
And statued pinnacles, mute as they. 

How faintly-flush'd, how phantom-fair, 65 

Was Monte Rosa, hanging there 

A thousand shadowy-pencill'd valleys 
And snowy dells in a golden air. 



1 64 g>rlect ^otma of ^mn^sfon 

Remember how we came at last 

To Como ; shower and storm and blast 70 

Had blown the lake beyond his limit, 
And all was flooded ; and how we past 

From Como, when the light was gray, 
And in my head, for half the day, 

The rich Virgilian rustic measure ye 

Of Lari Maxume, all the way, 

Like ballad-burthen music, kept, 
As on the Lariano crept 

To that fair port below the castle 
Of Queen Theodolind, where we slept j 80 

Or hardly slept, but watch'd awake 
A cypress in the moonlight shake, 

The moonlight touching o'er a terrace 
One tall Agave above the lake. 

What more ? we took our last adieu, 85 

And up the snowy Splugen drew. 

But ere we reach'd the highest summit 
I pluck'd a daisy, I gave it you. 

It told of England then to me. 

And now it tells of Italy. 90 

O love, we two shall go no longer 
To lands of summer across the sea ; 



OTill 165 

So dear a life your arms enfold 
Whose crying is a cry for gold : 

Yet here to-night in this dark city, 95 

When ill and weary, alone and cold, 

I found, tho' crush'd to hard and dry. 
This nursling of another sky 

Still in the little book you lent me, 
And where you tenderly laid it by : 100 

And I forgot the clouded Forth, 

The gloom that saddens Heaven and Earth, 

The bitter east, the misty summer 
And gray metropolis of the North. 

Perchance, to lull the throbs of pain, 105 

Perchance, to charm a vacant brain, 

Perchance, to dream you still beside me. 
My fancy fled to the South again. 



WILL. 

I. 

O WELL for him whose will is strong! 
He suffers, but he will not suffer long; 
He suffers, but he cannot suffer wrong 



1 66 g)elect J^oem0 of tETntn^^on 

For him nor moves the loud world's random 

mock, 
Nor all Calamity's hugest waves confound, 5 

Who seems a promontory of rock. 
That, compass'd round with turbulent sound, 
In middle ocean meets the surging shock, 
Tempest-bufFeted, citadel-crown'd. 

n. 

But ill for him who, bettering not with time, lo 

Corrupts the strength of heaven-descended Will, 

And ever weaker grows thro' acted crime. 

Or seeming-genial venial fault, 

Recurring and suggesting still ! 

He seems as one whose footsteps halt 15 

Toiling in immeasurable sand. 

And o'er a weary, sultry land. 

Far beneath a blazing vault, 

Sown in a wrinkle of the monstrous hill, 

The city sparkles like a grain of salt. 20 



WAGES. 

Glory of warrior, glory of orator, glory of 
song. 
Paid with a voice flying by to be lost on an 
endless sea — 



Glory of Virtue, to fight, to struggle, to right 
the wrong — 
Nay, but she aim'd not at glory, no lover of 
glory she : 
Give her the glory of going on, and still to be. 5 

The wages of sin is death : if the wages of 
Virtue be dust. 
Would she have heart to endure for the life 
of the worm and the fly ? 
She desires no isles of the blest, no quiet seats 
of the just. 
To rest in a golden grove, or to bask in a 
summer sky : 
Give her the wages of going on, and not to die. 10 



THE HIGHER PANTHEISM. 

The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills 

and the plains — 
Are not these, O Soul, the Vision of Him who 

reigns ? 

Is not the Vision He ? tho* he be not that which 

He seems ? 
Dreams are true while they last, and do we not 

live in dreams ? 



1 68 g)elect poemsf of ®mn^0on 

Earth, these solid stars, this weight of body and 

limb, 5 

Are they not sign and symbol of thy division 
from Him ? 

Dark is the world to thee : thyself art the reason 

why ; 
For is He not all but that which has power to 

feel ' I am I ! ' 

Glory about thee, without thee : and thou ful- 
fillest thy doom. 

Making Him broken gleams, and a stifled splen- 
dour and gloom. lo 

Speak to Him thou for He hears, and Spirit with 

Spirit can meet — 
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than 

hands and feet. 

God is law, say the wise ; O Soul, and let us 

rejoice. 
For if He thunder by law the thunder is yet 

His voice. 

Law is God, say some : no God at all, says 

the fool ; >5 

For all we have power to see is a straight stafF 
bent in a pool ; 



GTlje J^igljer ^mt^tiam 169 

And the ear of man cannot hear, and the eye 

of man cannot see ; 
But if we could see and hear, this Vision^ 

were it not He ? 



IN MEMORIAM A. H. H. 

OBIIT MDCCCXXXIII. 

1850. 

Love Victorious. 

Strong Son of God, immortal Love, 
Whom we, that have not seen thy face. 
By faith, and faith alone, embrace. 

Believing where we cannot prove ; 

Thine are these orbs of light and shade ; 5 

Thou madest Life in man and brute ; 
Thou madest Death ; and lo, thy foot 

Is on the skull which thou hast made. 

Thou wilt not leave us in the dust : 

Thou madest man, he knows not why, ,q 
He thinks he was not made to die ; 

And thou hast made him : thou art just. 

Thou seemest human and divine. 

The highest, holiest manhood, thou : 

Our wills are ours, we know not how; 15 

Our wills are ours, to make them thine. 



3(In ^mrortam 171 

Our little systems have their day ; 

They have their day and cease to be : 
They are but broken lights of thee, 

And thou, O Lord, art more than they. 20 

We have but faith : we cannot know ; 

For knowledge is of things we see ; 

And yet we trust it comes from thee, 
A beam in darkness : let it grow. 

Let knowledge grow from more to more, 25 
But more of reverence in us dwell ; 
That mind and soul, according well. 

May make one music as before. 

But vaster. We are fools and slight ; 

We mock thee when we do not fear : 30 
But help thy foolish ones to bear ; 

Help thy vain worlds to bear thy light. 

Forgive what seem'd my sin in me ; 

What seem'd my worth since I began ; 

For merit lives from man to man, 35 

And not from man, O Lord to thee. 

Forgive my grief for one removed. 
Thy creature, whom I found so fair. 
I trust he lives in thee, and there 

I find him worthier to be loved. 40 



172 Select ponn0 of ®enn^0on 

Forgive these wild and wandering cries. 

Confusions of a wasted youth ; 

Forgive them where they fail in truth, 
And in thy wisdom make me wise. 

Proem. 

The Friend^ the Heart of All Things, 

Dear friend, far ofF, my lost desire, 

So far, so near in woe and weal ; 

O loved the most, when most I feel 
There is a lower and a higher; 

Known and unknown ; human, divine ; 5 

Sweet human hand and lips and eye ; 
Dear heavenly friend that canst not die, 

Mine, mine, for ever, ever mine; 

Strange friend, past, present, and to be ; 

Loved deeplier, darklier understood ; 10 

Behold, I dream a dream of good, 

And mingle all the world with thee. 

cxxix. 

Burial at CI eve don. 

The Danube to the Severn gave 

The darkened heart that beat no more ; 
They laid him by the pleasant shore, 

And in the hearing of the wave. 



3|n ^entoriam 173 

There twice a day the Severn fills ; S 

The salt sea-water passes by, 
And hushes half the babbling Wye, 

And makes a silence in the hills. 

The Wye is hush'd nor moved along, 

And hush'd my deepest grief of all, lo 

When fiird with tears that cannot fall, 

I brim with sorrow drowning song. 

The tide flows down, the wave again 

Is vocal in its wooded walls ; 

My deeper anguish also falls, 15 

And I can speak a little then. 



xtx. 



College Re-visited. 

I past beside the reverend walls 
In which of old I wore the gown ; 
I roved at random thro* the town. 

And saw the tumult of the halls ; 

And heard once more in college fanes 
The storm their high-built organs make. 
And thunder-music, rolling, shake 

The prophet blazon'd on the panes ; 



1 74 Select J^omifif of tETenn^^on 

And caught once more the distant shout, 

The measured pulse of racing oars lo 

Among the willows ; paced the shores 

And many a bridge, and all about 

The same gray flats again, and felt 

The same, but not the same ; and last 

Up that long walk of limes I past '5 

To see the rooms in which he dwelt. 

Another name was on the door : 
I lingered ; all within was noise 
Of songs, and clapping hands, and boys 

That crash'd the glass and beat the floor ; 20 

Where once we held debate, a band 
Of youthful friends, on mind and art, 
And labour, and the changing mart, 

And all the framework of the land ; 

When one would aim an arrow fair, 25 

But send it slackly from the string; 
And one would pierce an outer ring, 

And one an inner, here and there ; 

And last the master bowman, he, 

Would cleave the mark. A willing ear 30 
We lent him. Who, but hung to hear 

The rapt oration flowing free 



3|n^emoriam 175 

From point to point, with power and grace 
And music in the bounds of law. 
To those conclusions when we saw 35 

The God within him light his face, 

And seem to lift the form, and glow 

In azure orbits heavenly-wise ; 

And over those ethereal eyes 
The bar of Michael Angelo. ^o 

Ixxxvii. 



Holidays at Somersby. 

Witch-elms that counterchange the floor 
Of this flat lawn with dusk and bright ; 
And thou, with all thy breadth and height 

Of foliage, towering sycamore ; 

How often, hither wandering down 5 

My Arthur found your shadows fair, 
And shook to all the liberal air 

The dust and din and steam of town : 

He brought an eye for all he saw ; 

He mixt in all our simple sports ; 10 

They pleased him fresh from brawling courts 

And dusty purlieus of the law. 



176 Select |0onn0 of QTmn^^on 

O joy to him in this retreat, 

Immantled in ambrosial dark, 

To drink the cooler air, and mark 15 

The landscape winking thro' the heat : 

O sound to rout the brood of cares. 
The sweep of scythe in morning dew. 
The gust that round the garden flew, 

And tumbled half the mellowing pears ! 20 

O bliss, when all in circle drawn 
About him, heart and ear were fed 
To hear him, as he lay and read 

The Tuscan poets on the lawn : 

Or in the all-golden afternoon 25 

A guest, or happy sister, sung. 
Or here she brought the harp and flung 

A ballad to the brightening moon : 

Nor less it pleased in livelier moods, 

Beyond the bounding hill to stray, 30 

And break the livelong summer day 

With banquet in the distant woods j 

Whereat we glanced from theme to theme, 
Discuss'd the books to love or hate. 



31n ^emoriam 177 

Or touchM the changes of the state, -^ 

Or threaded some Socratic dream ; 

But if I praised the busy town, 

He loved to rail against it still, 

For ground in yonder social mill 
We rub each other's angles down, 40 

' And merge ' he said ' in form and gloss 
The picturesque of man and man.' 
We talk'd : the stream beneath us ran. 

The wine-flask lying couch'd in moss. 

Or cool'd within the glooming wave ; 45 

And last, returning from afar. 

Before the crimson-circled star 
Had fall'n into her father's grave. 

And brushing ankle-deep in flowers. 

We heard behind the woodbine veil 50 

The milk that bubbled in the pail. 

And buzzings of the honied hours. 



Ixxxix, 



The Friend's Character. 

Heart-Aflduence in discursive talk 

From household fountains never dry ; 



1 7 8 ^tlttt jaorms of ®mn^0on 

The critic clearness of an eye, 
That saw thro' all the Muses* walk; 

Seraphic intellect and force 5 

To seize and throw the doubts of man ; 
Impassioned logic, which outran 

The hearer in its fiery course ; 

High nature amorous of the good, 

But touch'd with no ascetic gloom ; lo 

And passion pure in snowy bloom 

Thro' all the years of April blood ; 

A love of freedom rarely felt, 

Of freedom in her regal seat 

Of England; not the school-boy heat, is 
The blind hysterics of the Celt ; 

And manhood fused with female grace 
In such a sort, the child would twine 
A trustful hand, unask'd, in thine. 

And find his comfort in thy face ; ao 

All these have been, and thee mine eyes 
Have look'd on : if they look'd in vain. 
My shame is greater who remain. 

Nor let thy wisdom make me wise. 



CIX, 



ifln^emoriam 179 



The Friend's Eloquence, 

Thy converse drew us with delight, 
The men of rathe and riper years : 
The feeble soul, a haunt of fears, 

Forgot his weakness in thy sight. 

On thee the loyal-hearted hung, 5 

The proud was half disarm'd of pride. 
Nor cared the serpent at thy side 

To flicker with his double tongue. 

The stern were mild when thou wert by. 
The flippant put himself to school 10 

And heard thee, and the brazen fool 

Was softenM, and he knew not why ; 

While I, thy nearest, sat apart, 

And felt thy triumph was as mine ; 
And loved them more, that they were 
thine, 15 

The graceful tact, the Christian art ; 

Nor mine the sweetness or the skill. 
But mine the love that will not tire. 
And, born of love, the vague desire 

That spurs an imitative will. ao 



i8o &t\ttt poenifi? of (E^enn^fifon 



Gentleman Defined. 

The churl in spirit, up or down 
Along the scale of ranks, thro' all. 
To him who grasps a golden ball, 

By blood a king, at heart a clown ; 

The churl in spirit, howe'er he veil 5 

His want in forms for fashion's sake, 
Will let his coltish nature break 

At seasons thro' the gilded pale : 

For who can always act ? but he, 

To whom a thousand memories call, lo 
Not being less but more than all 

The gentleness he seem'd to be, 

Best seem'd the thing he was, and join'd 

Each office of the social hour 

To noble manners, as the flower 15 

And native growth of noble mind ; 

Nor ever narrowness or spite. 
Or villain fancy fleeting by. 
Drew in the expression of an eye. 

Where God and Nature met in light ; 20 



3|n ^txnomxn i8i 

And thus he bore without abuse 
The grand old name of gentleman, 
Defamed by every charlatan, 

And soird with all ignoble use. 



CXI. 



The Friend* s Letters. 

By night we linger'd on the lawn. 
For underfoot the herb was dry ; 
And genial warmth ; and o'er the sky 

The silvery haze of summer drawn ; 

And calm that let the tapers burn - 

Unwavering : not a cricket chirrM : 
The brook alone far-ofF was heard. 

And on the board the fluttering urn: 

And bats went round in fragrant skies. 

And wheel'd or lit the filmy shapes lo 

That haunt the dusk, with ermine capes 

And woolly breasts and beaded eyes; 

While now we sang old songs that peal'd 
From knoll to knoll, where, couch'd at 

ease, 15 

The white kine glimmer'd, and the trees 

Laid their dark arms about the field. 



1 8 2 Select l^oems? of tETenn^^on 

But when those others, one by one, 

Withdrew themselves from me and night, 
And in the house hght after light 

Went out, and I was all alone, a© 

A hunger seized my heart ; I read 

Of that glad year which once had been, 

In those fall'n leaves which kept their green. 

The noble letters of the dead : 

And strangely on the silence broke 25 

The silent-speaking words, and strange 
Was love's dumb cry defying change 

To test his worth j and strangely spoke 

The faith, the vigour, bold to dwell 

On doubts that drive the coward back, 30 

And keen thro' wordy snares to track 

Suggestion to her inmost cell. 

So word by word, and line by line. 

The dead man touch'd me from the past. 

And all at once it seem'd at last 35 

The living soul was flash'd on mine. 

And mine in this was wound, and whirl'd 
About empyreal heights of thought. 
And came on that which is, and caught 

The deep pulsations of the world, 40 



31n ^pemoriam 183 

iEonian music measuring out 

The steps of Time — the shocks of Chance — 
The blows of Death. At length my trance 

Was canceird, stricken thro* with doubt. 

Vague words ! but ah, how hard to frame 45 

In matter-moulded forms of speech, 
Or ev'n for intellect to reach 

Thro' memory that which I became : 

Till now the doubtful dusk reveal'd 

The knolls once more where, couch'd at ease, 50 
The white kine glimmer'd, and the trees 

Laid their dark arms about the field : 

And, suck'd from out the distant gloom, 

A breeze began to tremble o'er 

The large leaves of the sycamore, 55 

And fluctuate all the still perfume, 

And gathering freshlier overhead, 

Rock'd the full-foliaged elms, and swung 
The heavy-folded rose, and flung 

The lilies to and fro, and said. 



60 



' The dawn, the dawn,' and died away ; 
And East and West, without a breath, 
Mixt their dim lights, like life and death, 

To broaden into boundless day. 



xcv. 



84 ^tlttt }aoem0 of tirmn^0on 



Nature Pitiless, 

' So careful of the type ? ' but no. 

From scarped clifF and quarried stone 
She cries, ' A thousand types are gone : 
I care for nothing, all shall go. 

' Thou makest thine appeal to me : 5 

I bring to life, I bring to death : 
The spirit does but mean the breath : 
I know no more.' And he, shall he, 

Man, her last work, who seem'd so fair, 

Such splendid purpose in his eyes, lo 

Who roll'd the psalm to wintry skies. 

Who built him fanes of fruitless prayer, 

Who trusted God was love indeed 

And love Creation's final law — 

Tho' Nature, red in tooth and claw 15 

With ravine, shriek'd against his creed — 

Who loved, who suffered countless ills. 
Who battled for the True, the Just, 
Be blown about the desert dust. 

Or seal'd within the iron hills ? 20 



3In ^petnoriam 185 

No more ? A monster then, a dream, 
A discord. Dragons of the prime. 
That tare each other in their slime. 

Were mellow music match'd with him. 

life as futile, then, as frail ! ^5 

for thy voice to soothe and bless ! 
What hope of answer, or redress ? 

Behind the veil, behind the veil. 

Ivi. 

The Hearths Revolt, 

That which we dare invoke to bless ; 

Our dearest faith ; our ghastliest doubt ; 

He, They, One, All ; within, without ; 
The Power in darkness whom we guess j 

1 found Him not in world or sun, 5 

Or eagle's wing, or insect's eye ; 
Nor thro' the questions men may try. 
The petty cobwebs we have spun : 

If e'er when faith had fall'n asleep, 

1 heard a voice ' believe no more ' 10 
And heard an ever-breaking shore 

That tumbled in the Godless deep; 



1 86 g^elect J^oentfif of tETntn^s^on 

A warmth within the breast would melt 
The freezing reason's colder part, 
And like a man in wrath the heart 15 

Stood up and answer'd ' I have felt.' 

No, like a child in doubt and fear : 

But that blind clamour made me wise ; 
Then was I as a child that cries. 

But, crying, knows his father near ; 20 

And what I am beheld again 

What is, and no man understands ; 
And out of darkness came the hands 

That reach thro' nature, moulding men. 



The Goal of III 

Oh yet we trust that somehow good 
Will be the final goal of ill, 
To pangs of nature, sins of will, 

Defects of doubt, and taints of blood ; 

That nothing walks with aimless feet ; 
That not one life shall be destroy'd. 
Or cast as rubbish to the void. 

When God hath made the pile complete ; 



31n^nnoriam 187 

That not a worm is cloven in vain ; 

That not a moth with vain desire lo 

Is shrivell'd in a fruitless fire, 
Or but subserves another's gain. 

Behold, we know not anything ; 
I can but trust that good shall fall 
At last — far off — at last, to all, 

And every winter change to spring. 



»5 



So runs my dream : but what am I ? 

An infant crying in the night : 

An infant crying for the light : 
And with no language but a cry. 20 



Irv. 



The Larger Hope. 

The wish, that of the living whole 
No life may fail beyond the grave, 
Derives it not from what we have 

The likest God within the soul ? 

Are God and Nature then at strife. 
That Nature lends such evil dreams ? 
So careful of the type she seems. 

So careless of the single life j 



i88 Select jaoemsf of tETmn^fifon 

That I, considering everywhere 

Her secret meaning in her deeds, lo 

And finding that of fifty seeds 
She often brings but one to bear, 

I falter where I firmly trod, 

And falling with my weight of cares 
Upon the great world's altar stairs ,r 

That slope thro' darkness up to God, 

I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope, 
And gather dust and chafF, and call 
To what I feel is Lord of all. 

And faintly trust the larger hope. 20 



/*. 



God^ Nature and the Friend. 

Thy voice is on the rolling air ; 

I hear thee where the waters run ; 

Thou standest in the rising sun, 
And in the setting thou art fair. 

What art thou then ? I cannot guess ; 
But tho' I seem in star and flower 
To feel thee some diflFuslve power, 

I do not therefore love thee less : 



31n ^emoriam 189 

My love involves the love before; 

My love is vaster passion now ; lo 

Tho' mix'd with God and Nature thou, 

I seem to love thee more and more. 

Far off thou art, but ever nigh ; 

I have thee still, and I rejoice; 

I prosper, circled with thy voice ; 15 

I shall not lose thee tho' I die. 



cxxx. 



Supplicatio, 

O living will that shalt endure 

When all that seems shall suffer shock, 

Rise in the spiritual rock. 
Flow thro' our deeds and make them pure, 

That we may lift from out of dust 5 

A voice as unto him that hears, 
A cry above the conquered years 

To one that with us works, and trust. 

With faith that comes of self-control. 

The truths that never can be proved 10 
Until we close with all we loved. 

And all we flow from, soul in soul. 



MAUD, AND OTHER POEMS. 

1855. 

THE HAPPY LOVER. 

I. 

I HAVE led her home, my love, my only friend 

There is none like her, none. 

And never yet so warmly ran my blood 

And sweetly, on and on 

Calming itself to the long-wish'd-for end, 5 

Full to the banks, close on the promised good. 

II. 

None like her, none. 

Just now the dry-tongued laurels' pattering talk 
Seem'd her light foot along the garden walk, 
And shook my heart to think she comes once 

more ; 10 

But even then I heard her close the door. 
The gates of Heaven are closed, and she is 

gone. 

III. 

There is none like her, none. 

Nor will be when our summers have deceased. 



^\)t l^app^ ilotjer 191 

O, art thou sighing for Lebanon ,5 

In the long breeze that streams to thy delicious 

East, 
Sighing for Lebanon, 

Dark cedar, tho* thy limbs have here increased. 
Upon a pastoral slope as fair, 

And looking to the South, and fed *o 

With honey'd rain and delicate air, 
And haunted by the starry head 
Of her whose gentle will has changed my fate. 
And made my life a perfumed altar-flame ; 
And over whom thy darkness must have spread 25 
With such delight as theirs of old, thy great 
Forefathers of the thornless garden, there 
Shadowing the snow-limb'd Eve from whom 

she came. 

IV. 

Here will I lie, while these long branches sway. 

And you fair stars that crown a happy day 3° 

Go in and out as if at merry play. 

Who am no more so all forlorn. 

As when it seem*d far better to be born 

To labour and the mattock-harden'd hand. 

Than nursed at ease and brought to understand 35 

A sad astrology, the boundless plan 

That makes you tyrants in your iron skies. 

Innumerable, pitiless, passionless eyes. 



192 Select poem0 of ®mn^0on 

Cold fires, yet with power to burn and brand 
His nothingness into man. 40 

V. 
But now shine on, and what care I, 
Who in this stormy gulf have found a pearl 
The countercharm of space and hollow sky, 
And do accept my madness, and would die 
To save from some slight shame one simple girl. 45 

VI. 

Would die; for sullen-seeming Death may give 

More life to Love than is or ever was 

In our low world, where yet *t is sweet to live. 

Let no one ask me how it came to pass; 

It seems that I am happy, that to me 50 

A livelier emerald twinkles in the grass, 

A purer sapphire melts into the sea. 

VII. 

Not die ; but live a life of truest breath. 
And teach true life to fight with mortal wrongs. 
O, why should Love, like men in drinking-songs, 55 
Spice his fair banquet with the dust of death ? 
Make answer, Maud my bliss, 
Maud made my Maud by that long loving kiss. 
Life of my life, wilt thou not answer this ? 
' The dusky strand of Death inwoven here 60 

With dear Love's tie, makes Love himself more 
dear.* 



®t)e l^app^ ilotjer 193 

VIII. 

Is that enchanted moan only the swell 
Of the long waves that roll in yonder bay ? 
And hark the clock within, the silver knell 
Of twelve sweet hours that past in bridal white, 65 
And died to live, long as my pulses play ; 
But now by this my love has closed her sight 
And given false death her hand, and stol'n away 
To dreamful wastes where footless fancies dwell 
Among the fragments of the golden day. 70 

May nothing there her maiden grace affright ! 
Dear heart, I feel with thee the drowsy spell. 
My bride to be, my evermore delight. 
My own heart's heart, my ownest own, fare- 
well ; 
It is but for a little space I go : 75 

And ye meanwhile far over moor and fell 
Beat to the noiseless music of the night ! 
Has our whole earth gone nearer to the glow 
Of your soft splendours that you look so bright ? 
/ have climb'd nearer out of lonely Hell. 80 

Beat, happy stars, timing with things below, 
Beat with my heart more blest than heart can 

tell. 
Blest, but for some dark undercurrent woe 
That seems to draw — but it shall not be so : 
Let all be well, be well. 85 

xviii. 



BALLADS AND OTHER POEMS. 

1880. 

RIZPAH. 

17—- 

I. 

Wailing, wailing, wailing, the wind over land 

and sea — 
And Willy's voice in the wind, ' O mother, 

come out to me.' 
Why should he call me to-night when he knows 

that I cannot go ? 
For the downs are as bright as day, and the 

full moon stares at the snow. 

II. 

We should be seen, my dear; they would spy 
us out of the town. 

The loud black nights for us, and the storm 
rushing over the down. 

When I cannot see my own hand, but am led 
by the creak of the chain. 

And grovel and grope for my son till I find my- 
self drenched with the rain. 



Kijpa^ 195 

III. 

Anything fallen again ? nay — what was there 

left to fall ? 
I have taken them home, I have numbered the 

bones, I have hidden them all. 10 

What am I saying ? and what are you ? do you 

come as a spy ? 
Falls ? what falls ? who knows ? As the tree 

falls so must it lie. 

IV. 

Who let her in ? how long has she been ? you 

— what have you heard ? 
Why did you sit so quiet ? you never have 

spoken a word. 

— to pray with me — yes — a lady — none 

of their spies — 15 

But the night has crept into my heart, and be- 
gun to darken my eyes. 

V. 

Ah — you, that have lived so soft, what should 

you know of the night. 
The blast and the burning shame and the bitter 

frost and the fright ? 

1 have done it, while you were asleep — you 

were only made for the day. 
I have gather'd my baby together — and now 

you may go your way. ao 



196 g)elect poentflf of ®rnn^0on 

VI. 

Nay — for it's kind of you, Madam, to sit by 

an old dying wife. 
But say nothing hard of my boy, I have only an 

hour of life. 
I kiss'd my boy in the prison before he went 

out to die. 
' They dared me to do it,' he said, and he never 

has told me a lie. 
I whipt him for robbing an orchard once when 

he was but a child — 
' The farmer dared me to do it,' he said ; he 

was always so wild — 
And idle — and could n't be idle — my W illy — 

he never could rest. 
The King should have made him a soldier, he 

would have been one of his best. 

VII. 

But he lived with a lot of wild mates, and they 

never would let him be good ; 
They swore that he dare not rob the mail, and 

he swore that he would. 
And he took no life, but he took one purse, and 

when all was done 
He flung it among his fellows — I '11 none of 

it, said my son. 



Kijpat) 197 

VIII. 

I came into court to the Judge and the lawyers. 

I told them my tale, 
God's own truth — but they kill'd him, they 

kill'd him for robbing the mail. 
They hang'd him in chains for a show — we 

had always borne a good name. 35 

To be hang'd for a thief — and then put away 

— is n't that enough shame ? 
Dust to dust — low down — let us hide ! but 

they set him so high 
That all the ships of the world could stare at 

him, passing by. 
God 'ill pardon the hell-black raven and horrible 

fowls of the air. 
But not the black heart of the lawyer who kill'd 

him and hang'd him there. 40 

IX. 

And the jailer forced me away. I had bid him 
my last goodbye ; 

They had fasten'd the door of his cell. ' O 
mother ! ' I heard him cry. 

I could n't get back tho' I tried, he had some- 
thing further to say, 

And now I never shall know it. The jailer 
forced me away. 



198 Select poem0 of tE'tnn^&on 

X. 

Then since I could n't but hear that cry of my 

boy that was dead, 45 

They seized me and shut me up : they fasten'd 

me down on my bed. 
'Mother, O mother!' — he call'd in the dark 

to me year after year — 
They beat me for that, they beat me — you 

know that I could n't but hear ; 
And then at the last they found I had grown so 

stupid and still 
They let me abroad again — but the creatures 

had worked their will. 50 

XL 
Flesh of my flesh was gone, but bone of my 

bone was left — 
I stole them all from the lawyers — and you, 

will you call it a theft ? — 
My baby, the bones that had suck'd me, the 

bones that had laughed and had cried — 
Theirs ? O no ! they are mine — not theirs — 

they had moved in mv side. 

XII. 

Do you think I was scared by the bones ? I 

kiss'd 'em, I buried 'em all — 55 

I can't dig deep, I am old — in the night, by the 
churchyard wall. 



Ki^pali 199 

My Willy 'ill rise up whole when the trumpet 

of judgment 'ill sound, 
But I charge you never to say that I laid him 

in holy ground. 

xm. 
They would scratch him up — they would hang 

him again on the cursed tree. 
Sin ? O yes — we are sinners I know — let all 

that be, 60 

And read me a Bible verse of the Lord's good 

will toward men — 
' Full of compassion and mercy the Lord ' — 

let me hear it again ; 
* Full of compassion and mercy — long-sufFer- 

ing.' Yes, O yes ! 
For the lawyer is born but to murder — the 

Saviour lives but to bless. 
He '11 never put on the black cap except for the 

worst of the worst, 65 

And the first may be last — I have heard it in 

church — and the last may be first. 
Suffering — O long-suffering — yes, as the Lord 

must know. 
Year after year in the mist and the wind and 

the shower and the snow. 



200 Select ponnflf of ^tnn^ion 

XIV. 
Heard, have you ? what ? they have told you 

he never repented his sin. 
How do they know it ? are they his mother ? are 

you of his kin ? 70 

Heard ! have you ever heard, when the storm on 

the downs began, 
The wind that 'ill wail like a child and the sea 

that 'ill moan like a man ? 

XV. 

Election, Election and Reprobation — it 's all 

very well. 
But I go to-night to my boy, and I shall not 

find him in Hell. 
For I cared so much for my boy that the Lord 

has look'd into my care, 75 

And he means me I 'm sure to be happy with 

Willy, I know not where. 

XVI. 

And if he be lost — but to save my soul, that is 

all your desire : 
Do you think that I care for my soul if my boy 

be gone to the fire ? 
I have been with God in the dark — go, go, you 

may leave me alone — 
You never have borne a child — you are just as 

hard as a stone. 80 



®lie Hetienge 201 

XVII. 

Madam, I beg your pardon ! I think that you 

mean to be kind, 
But I cannot hear what you say for my Willy's 

voice in the wind — 
The snow and the sky so bright — he used but 

to call in the dark. 
And he calls me now from the church and not 

from the gibbet — for hark ! 
Nay — you can hear it yourself — it is coming 

— shaking the walls — 85 

Willy — the moon 's in a cloud — Good-night. 

I am going. He calls. 

THE REVENGE. 

A BALLAD OF THE FLEET. 
I. 

At Flores in the Azores Sir Richard Grenville 

lay, 
And a pinnace, like a flutter'd bird, came flying 

from far away : 
' Spanish ships of war at sea ! we have sighted 

fifty-three ! ' 
Then sware Lord Thomas Howard : ' 'Fore 

God I am no coward ; 



202 §)elrtt ^otm& of ®enn^8fon 

But I cannot meet them here, for my ships are 

out of gear, 5 

And the half my men are sick. I must fly, but 
follow quick. 

We are six ships of the line ; can we fight with 
fifty-three ? ' 

II. 

Then spake Sir Richard Grenville : ' I know 

you are no coward ; 
You fly them for a moment to fight with them 

again. 
But I Ve ninety men and more that are lying 

sick ashore. 10 

I should count myself the coward if I left them, 

my lord Howard, 
To these Inquisition dogs and the devildoms of 

Spain.* 

III. 

So Lord Howard passed away with five ships 

of war that day. 
Till he melted like a cloud in the silent summer 

heaven : 
But Sir Richard bore in hand all his sick men 

from the land 15 

Very carefully and slow. 
Men of Bideford in Devon, 
And we laid them on the ballast down below ; 



^\)t Hebenge 203 

For we brought them all on board, 

And they blest him in their pain, that they were 

not left to Spain, 20 

To the thumb-screw and the stake, for the 

glory of the Lord. 

IV. 

He had only a hundred seamen to work the ship 

and to fight. 
And he sailed away from Flores till the Spaniard 

came in sight. 
With his huge sea-castles heaving upon the 

weather bow. 
' Shall we fight or shall we fly ? 25 

Good Sir Richard, tell us now. 
For to fight is but to die! 
There '11 be little of us left by the time this sun 

be set.' 
And Sir Richard said again : ' We be all good 

English men. 
Let us bang these dogs of Seville, the children 

of the devil, 3° 

For I never turn'd my back upon Don or devil 

yet.' 

V. 

Sir Richard spoke and he laugh'd, and we roar'd 

a hurrah, and so 
The little Revenge ran on sheer into the heart 

of the foe, 



204 Select l^oents of tBmn^ion 

With her hundred fighters on deck, and her 

ninety sick below ; 
For half of their fleet to the right and half to 

the left were seen 35 

And the little Revenge ran on thro' the long 

sea-lane between. 

VI. 

Thousands of their soldiers look'd down from 
their decks and laugh'd, 

Thousands of their seamen made mock of the 
mad little craft 

Running on and on, till delay'd 

By their mountain-like San Philip that, of fif- 
teen hundred tons, . 40 

And upshadowing high above us with her yawn- 
ing tiers of guns. 

Took the breath from our sails, and we stay'd. 

VII. 

And while now the great San Philip hung above 

us like a cloud 
Whence the thunderbolt will fall 
Long and loud, 45 

Four galleons drew away 
From the Spanish fleet that day, 
And two upon the larboard and two upon the 

starboard lay. 
And the battle-thunder broke from them all. 



Srije Hetjenge 205 

VIII. 

But anon the great San Philip, she bethought of 

herself and went 50 

Having that within her womb that had left her 

ill content ; 
And the rest they came aboard us, and they 

fought us hand to hand. 
For a dozen times they came with their pikes 

and musketeers. 
And a dozen times we shook 'em ofF as a dog 

that shakes his ears 
When he leaps from the water to the land. 55 

IX. 

And the sun went down and the stars came out 

far over the summer sea, 
But never a moment ceased the fight of the one 

and the fifty-three. 
Ship after ship, the whole night long, their high- 
built galleons came. 
Ship after ship, the whole night long, with her 

battle-thunder and flame ; 
Ship after ship, the whole night long, drew back 

with her dead and her shame. 60 

For some were sunk and many were shattered, 

and so could fight us no more — 
God of battles, was ever a battle like this in the 

world before ? 



2o6 ^tittt ^otm$ of tirenn^0on 

X. 

For he said ' Fight on ! fight on ! ' 

Tho' his vessel was all but a wreck ; 

And it chanced that, when half of the short 

summer night was gone, 65 

With a grisly wound to be drest he had left the 
deck. 

But a bullet struck him that was dressing it sud- 
denly dead. 

And himself he was wounded again in the side 
and the head, 

And he said ' Fight on ! fight on ! * 

XI. 

And the night went down, and the sun smiled 

out far over the summer sea, 7o 

And the Spanish fleet with broken sides lay 
round us all in a ring ; 

But they dared not touch us again, for they 
fear'd that we still could sting. 

So they watch'd what the end would be. 

And we had not fought them in vain, 

But in perilous plight were we, 75 

Seeing forty of our poor hundred slain, 

And half of the rest of us maim'd for life 

In the crash of the cannonades and the desper- 
ate strife ; 

And the sick men down in the hold were most 
of them stark and cold, 



QTtje Hetjenge 207 

And the pikes were all broken or bent, and the 

powder was all of it spent ; 80 

And the masts and the rigging were lying over 

the side ; 
But Sir Richard cried in his English pride 
' We have fought such a fight for a day and a 

night 
As may never be fought again ! 
We have won great glory, my men ! 85 

And a day less or more 
At sea or ashore. 
We die — does it matter when ? 
Sink me the ship, master Gunner — sink her, 

split her in twain ! 
Fall into the hands of God, not into the hands 

of Spain ! * 90 

XII. 

And the gunner said, ' Ay, ay,* but the seamen 

made reply : 
*• We have children, we have wives 
And the Lord hath spared our lives. 
We will make the Spaniard promise, if we yield, 

to let us go ; 
We shall live to fight again and to strike another 

blow.' ' 95 

And the lion there lay dying, and they yielded to 

the foe. 



2o8 ^tlttt ^otm& of ®enn^0on 

XIII. 

And the stately Spanish men to their flagship 
bore him then, 

Where they laid him by the mast, old Sir Rich- 
ard caught at last. 

And they praised him to his face with their 
courtly foreign grace ; 

But he rose upon their decks and he cried : loo 

' I have fought for Queen and Faith like a valiant 
man and true ; 

I have only done my duty as a man is bound to 
do : 

With a joyful spirit I Sir Richard Grenville 
dieP 

And he fell upon their decks and he died. 

XIV. 

And they stared at the dead that had been so 

valiant and true, 105 

And had holden the power and glory of Spain 

so cheap 
That he dared her with one little ship and his 

English few; 
Was he devil or man ? He was devil for aught 

they knew. 
But they sank his body with honour down into 

the deep, 
And they mann'd the Revenge with a swarthier 

alien crew, "° 



^\)t i^ebenge 209 

And away she sail'd with her loss and long'd 

for her own ; 
When a wind from the lands they had ruin'd 

awoke from sleqp, 
And the water began to heave and the weather 

to moan, 
And or ever that evening ended a great gale 

blew 
And a wave like the wave that is raised by an 

earthquake grew, "5 

Till it smote on their hulls and their sails and 

their masts and their flags 
And the whole sea plunged and fell on the shot- 

shatter'd navy of Spain, 
And the little Revenge herself went down by 

the island crags 
To be lost evermore in the main. 



TIRESIAS AND OTHER POEMS. 

THE SPINSTER'S SWEET-ARTS. 

I. 
Milk for my sweet-arts, Bess ! for it mun be 

the time about now 
When Molly cooms in fro* the far-end close 

wi' her paails fro' the cow. 
Eh I tha be new to the plaace — thou 'rt gaapin* 

— does n't tha see 
I calls 'em arter the fellers es once was sweet 

upo' me ? 

II. 
Naay to be sewer it be past 'er time. What 

maakes 'er sa laate ? 
Goa to the laane at the back, an* loook thruf 

Maddison's gaate ! 

III. 

Sweet-arts ! Molly belike may 'a lighted to- 
night upo' one. 

Sweet-arts ! thanks to the Lord that I niver not 
listen'd to noan ! 



QTtje g)pin0ter'fi? g>tDeet;^art0 2 1 1 

Soa I sits i' my oan armchair wi' my oan kettle 

theere o' the hob, 
An' Tommy the fust, an' Tommy the second, 

an' Steevie an' Rob. lo 

IV. 

Rob, coom oop 'ere o' my knee. Thou sees 

that i' spite o' the men 
I 'a kep' thruf thick an' thin my two 'oondred 

a-year to mysen ; 
Yis ! thaw tha call'd me es pretty es ony lass 

i' the Sheere ; 
An' thou be es pretty a Tabby, but Robby I seed 

thruf ya theere. 

V. 

Feyther 'ud say I wur ugly es sin, an' I beant 

not vaain, 15 

But I niver wur downright hugly, thaw soom 

*ud 'a thowt ma plaain. 
An' I was n't sa plaain i' pink ribbons, ye said I 

wur pretty i' pinks. 
An' I liked to 'ear it I did, but I beant sich a 

fool as ye thinks ; 
Ye was stroakin' ma down wi' the 'air, as I be 

a-stroakin o' you. 
But whiniver I loooked i' the glass I wur sewer 

that it could n't be true ; 20 



2 1 2 ^tlttt ^otmi of ®f nn^Bon 

Niver wur pretty, not I, but ye knaw'd it wur 

pleasant to 'ear, 
Thaw it war n't not me es wur pretty, but my 

two 'oondred a-year. 

VI. 

D' ya mind the murnin' when we was a walkin* 

togither, an* stood 
By the claay'd-oop pond, that the foalk be so 

scared at, i' Gigglesby wood, 
Wheer the poor wench drowndid hersen, black 

Sal, es 'ed been disgraaced ? 25 

An* I feel'd thy arm es I stood wur a-creeapin 

about my waaist ; 
An* me es wur alius afear'd of a man*s gittin' 

ower fond, 
I sidled awaay an' awaay till I plumpt foot fust 

i' the pond ; 
And, Robby, I niver *a liked tha sa well, as I 

did that daay. 
Fur tha joompt in thysen, an* tha hoickt my feet 

wi' a flop fro' the claay. 3° 

Ay, stick oop thy back, an' set oop thy taail, 

tha may gie ma a kiss. 
Fur I walk'd wi' tha all the way hoam an* wur 

niver sa' nigh saayin' Yis. 
But wa boath was i' sich a clat we was shaamed 

to cross Gigglesby Greean, 



Fur a cat may loook at a king tha knaws but the 

cat mun be clean. 
Sa we boath on us kep out o' sight o' the win- 
ders o' Gigglesby Hinn — 35 
Naay, but the claws o' tha ! quiet ! they pricks 

clean thruf to the skin — 
An' wa boath slinkt 'oam by the brokken shed 

i' the laane at the back, 
Wheer the poodle runn'd at tha once, an' tha 

runn'd oop o' the thack ; 
An' tha squeeg'd my 'and i' the shed, fur theer 

we was forced to 'ide, 
Fur I seed that Steevie wur coomin', and one 

o' the Tommies beside. 40 

VII. 

Theere now, what art 'a mewin' at, Steevie ? 

for owt I can tell — 
Robby wur fust to be sewer, or I mowt 'a liked 

tha as well. 

VIII. 
But, Robby, I thowt o' tha all the while I wur 

chaangin' my gown. 
An' I thowt shall I chaange my staate ? but, O 

Lord, upo' coomin' down — 
My bran-new carpet es fresh es a midder o' 

flowers i' Maay — 45 



214 Select |Soem0 of tETenn^^on 

Why 'edn't tha wiped tha shoes ? it wur clatted 

all ower wi' claay. 
An' I could 'a cried ammost, fur I seed that it 

could n't be. 
An' Robby I gied tha a raatin that sattled thy 

coortin o' me. 
An' Molly an' me was agreed, as we was a 

cleanin' the floor. 
That a man be a durty thing an' a trouble an* 

plague wi' indoor. 5° 

But I rued it arter a bit, fur I stuck to tha moor 

nor the rest. 
But I could n't 'a lived wi' a man an' I knaws 

it be all for the best. 

IX. 

Naay — let ma stroak tha down till I maakes 

tha es smooth es silk, 
But if I 'ed married tha, Robby, thou 'd not 'a 

been worth thy milk. 
Thou 'd niver 'a cotch'd ony mice but 'a left 

me the work to do, 55 

And 'a taaen to the bottle beside, so es all that 

I 'ears be true ; 
But I loovs tha to maake thysen happy an' soa 

purr awaay, my dear, 
Thou 'ed wellnigh purr'd ma awaay fro' my 

can two 'oonerd a-year. 



X. 

Swearin agean, you Toms, as ye used to do 

twelve year sin' ! 
Ye niver *eard Steevie swear 'cep it wur at a 

dog coomin* in, 60 

An* boath o' ye mun be fools to be hallus 

a-shawin your claws. 
Fur I niver cared nothink for neither — an' one 

o' ye dead ye knaws ! 
Coom give hoaver then, weant ye ? I warrant ye 

soom fine daay — 
Theere, lig down — I shall hev to gie one or 

tother awaay. 
Can't ye taake pattern by Steevie ? ye shant hev 

a drop fro' the paail. 65 

Steevie be right good manners bang thruf to the 

tip o' the taail. 

XI. 

Robby, git down wi' tha, wilt tha ? let Steevie 

coom oop o' my knee. 
Steevie, my lad, thou 'ed very nigh been the 

Steevie fur me ! 
Robby wur fust to be sewer, 'e wur burn an' 

bred i' the house. 
But thou be es 'ansom a tabby es iver patted a 

mouse. 70 



2i6 ^tittt ^otm& of tKmn^flfon 

XII. 

An* I beant not vaain, but I knaws I 'ed led tha 

a quieter life 
Nor her wi' the hepitaph yonder I " A faaithful 

an' loovin' wife ! " 
An' 'cos o' thy farm by the beck, an' thy wind- 
mill oop o' the croft, 
Tha thowt tha would marry ma, did tha? but 

that wur a bit ower soft, 
Thaw thou was es soaber es daay, wi' a niced red 

faace, an' es clean 75 

Es a shillin' fresh fro' the mint wi' a bran-new 

'ead o' the Queean, 
An' thy farmin' es clean es thysen, fur, Steevie, 

tha kep' it sa neat 
That I niver not spied sa much es a poppy along 

wi' the wheat. 
An' the wool of a thistle a-flyin an' seeadin' 

tha haated to see ; 
'Twur es bad es a battle-twig 'ere i' my oan 

blue chaumber to me. 80 

Ay, roob thy whiskers agean ma, fur I could 'a 

taaen to tha well 
But fur thy bairns, poor Steevie, a bouncin' boy 

an' a gell. 

* Earwig, 



XIII. 

An* thou was es fond o* thy bairns es I be my- 

sen o' my cats, 
But I niver not wish'd for childer, I hev n't naw 

likin* fur brats ; 
Pretty anew when ya dresses 'em oop, an' they 

goas fur a walk, 85 

Or sits wi' their 'ands afoor 'em, an' does n't 

not 'inder the talk ! 
But their bottles o' pap, an' their mucky bibs, 

an' the clats an' the clouts. 
An' their mashin' their toys to pieaces an' maak- 

in' ma deaf wi' their shouts. 
An' hallus a-joompin' about ma as if they was 

set upo' springs, 
An' a haxin' ma hawkard questions, an' saayin' 

ondecent things, 90 

An' a-callin' ma ' hugly ' mayhap to my faace, 

or a tearin' my gown — 
Dear ! dear ! dear ! I mun part them Tommies — 

Steevie git down. 

XIV. 

Ye be wuss nor the men-tommies, you. I tell'd 

ya, na moor o' that ! 
Tom, lig theere o' the cushion, an' tother Tom 

'ere o' the mat. 



2 1 8 ^tlttt poentflf of tE^enn^fifon 

XV. 
Theere ! I ha' master' d them ! Hed I married 

the Tommies — O Lord, 95 

To loove an' obaay the Tommies ! I could n't 

'a stuck by my word. 
To be horder'd about, an' waaked, when Molly 'd 

put out the light. 
By a man coomin' in wi' a hiccup at ony hour 

o' the night ! 
An' the taable staain'd wi' his aale, an' the mud 

o' his boots o' the stairs, 
An' the stink o' 'is pipe i' the 'ouse, an' the 

mark o' 'is 'ead o' the chairs ! 100 

An' noan o' my four sweet-arts 'ud 'a let me 'a 

'ed my oan waay, 
Sa I likes 'em best wi' taails when they 'evn't a 

word to saay. * 

XVI. 

An' I sits i' my oan little parlour, an' sarved by 

my oan little lass, 
Wi' my oan little garden outside, an' my oan bed 

o' sparrow-grass. 
An' my oan door-poorch wi' the woodbine an' 

jessmine a-dressin' it greean, 105 

An' my oan fine Jackman i' purple a roabin' the 

'ouse like a Queean. 



XVII. 

An* the little gells bobs to ma hofFens es I be 

abroad i' the laanes, 
When I goas to coomfut the poor es be down 

wi' their haaches an' their paains ; 
An' a haaf-pot o' jam, or a mossel o' meat when 

it beant too dear, 
They maakes ma a graater Laady nor 'er i' the 

mansion theer, no 

Hes 'es hallus to hax of a man how much to 

spare or to spend ; 
An' a spinster I be an' I will be, if soa please 

God, to the hend. 

XVIII. 
Mew ! mew ! — Bess wi' the milk ! what ha 

maade our Molly sa laate ? 
It should 'a been 'ere by seven, an' theere — it 

be strikin' height — 
' Cushie wur craazed fur 'er cauf,' well — I 'eard 

'er a maakin' 'er moan 115 

An' I thowt to mysen ' thank God that I hev n't 

naw cauf o' my oan.' 
Theere I 

Set It down ! 

Now Robby ! 

You Tommies shall waait to-night 
Till Robby an* Steevie 'es 'ed their lap — an' it 
sarves ye right. 



220 g>elect JBofm0 of tETenn^flfon 



TO VIRGIL. 

WRITTEN AT THE REQUEST OF THE MANTUANS 
FOR THE NINETEENTH CENTENARY OF VIR- 
GIL'S DEATH. 

I. 

Roman Virgil, thou that singest 

Ilion's lofty temples robed in fire, 

Ilion falling, Rome arising, 

wars, and filial faith and Dido's pyre ; 

II. 
Landscape-lover, lord of language 

More than he that sang the Works and 
Days, 
All the chosen coin of fancy 

flashing out from many a golden phrase ; 

III. 
Thou that singest wheat and woodland, 

tilth and vineyard, hive and horse and herd ; 5 
All the charm of all the Muses 

often flowering in a lonely word ; 

IV. 

Poet of the happy Tityrus 

piping underneath his beechen bowers ; 



GTo t^ix^il 221 

Poet of the poet-satyr 

whom the laughing shepherd bound with 
flowers ; 

V. 

Chanter of the Pollio, glorying 

in the blissful years again to be, 
Summers of the snakeless meadow, 

unlaborious earth and oarless sea ; lo 

VI. 

Thou that seest Universal 

Nature moved by Universal Mind ; 
Thou majestic in thy sadness 

at the doubtful doom of human kind ; 

VII. 

Light among the vanish'd ages ; 

star that gildest yet this phantom shore ; 
Golden branch amid the shadows, 

kings and realms that pass to rise no more ; 

VIII. 

Now thy Forum roars no longer, 

fallen every purple Caesar's dome — iS 

Tho' thine ocean-roll of rhythm 

sound for ever of Imperial Rome — 



222 g)elect |Boem0 of ^mn^&on 

IX. 

Now the Rome of slaves hath perish'd, 

and the Rome of freemen holds her place, 

I, from out the Northern Island 

sunder'd once from all the human race, 

X. 

I salute thee, Mantovano, 

I that loved thee since my day began, 
Wielder of the stateliest measure 

ever moulded by the lips of man. ao 



VASTNESS. 

I. 
Many a hearth upon our dark globe sighs after 

many a vanish'd face. 
Many a planet by many a sun may roll with the 

dust of a vanish'd race. 

II. 

Raving politics, never at rest — as this poor 

earth's pale history runs, — 
What is it all but a trouble of ants in the gleam 

of a million million of suns ? 



©afiftneflf0 223 

III. 

Lies upon this side, lies upon that side, truthless 

violence mourn'd by the Wise, 5 

Thousands of voices drowning his own in a 
popular torrent of lies upon lies. 

IV. 

Stately purposes, valour in battle, glorious an- 
nals of army and fleet. 

Death for the right cause, death for the wrong 
cause, trumpets of victory, groans of 
defeat. 

V. 

Innocence seethed in her mother's milk, and 
Charity setting the martyr aflame ; 

Thraldom who walks with the banner of Free- 
dom, and recks not to ruin a realm in 
her name. lo 

VI. 

Faith at her zenith or all but lost in the gloom 
of doubts that darken the schools ; 

Craft with a bunch of all-heal in her hand, fol- 
low'd up by her vassal legion of fools ; 

VII. 
Trade flying over a thousand seas with her spice 

and her vintage, her silk and her corn ; 
Desolate ofling, sailorless harbours, famishing 

populace, wharves forlorn 5 



224 Select ^otma of ®ntn^0on 

VIII. 

Star of the morning, Hope in the sunrise; gloom 

of the evening, Life at a close; 15 

Pleasure who flaunts on her wide down-way 
with her flying robe and her poison'd 
rose; 

IX. 

Pain, that has crawl'd from the corpse of Pleas- 
ure, a worm which writhes all day, and 
at night 

Stirs up again in the heart of the sleeper, and 
stings him back to the curse of the light ; 

X. 

Wealth with his wines and his wedded harlots ; 

honest Poverty bare to the bone ; 
Opulent Avarice, lean as Poverty ; Flattery 

gilding the rift in a throne ; 20 

XL 
Fame blowing out from her golden trumpet a 

jubilant challenge to Time and to Fate ; 
Slander, her shadow, sowing the nettle on all the 

laurel'd graves of the Great ; 

XII. 
Love for the maiden, crownM with marriage, no 

regrets for aught that has been ; 
Household happiness, gracious children, debtless 

competence, golden mean ; 



XIII. 

National hatreds of whole generations, and pigmy- 
spites of the village spire ; *5 

Vows that will last to the last death-ruckle, and 
vows that are snapt in a moment of fire ; 

XIV. 

He that has lived for the lust of the minute, and 
died in the doing it, flesh without mind ; 

He that has nail'd all flesh to the Cross, till Self 
died out in the love of his kind j 

XV. 
Spring and Summer and Autumn and Winter, 

and all these old revolutions of earth ; 
All new-old revolutions of Empire — change of 

the tide — what is all of it worth ? 30 

XVI. 

What the philosophies, all the sciences, poesy, 

varying voices of prayer ? 
All that is noblest, all that is basest, all that is 

filthy with all that is fair ? 

XVII. 

What is it all, if we all of us end but in being 

our own corpse-cofllins at last, 
Swallow'd in Vastness, lost in Silence, drown*d 

in the deeps of a meaningless Past .? 



226 &tltct poem0 of tCenn^flfon 

XVIII. 

What but a murmur of gnats in the gloom, or a 
moment's anger of bees in their hive ? — 35 
• ••••••• 

Peace, let it be 1 for I loved him, and love him 
for ever : the dead are not dead but alive. 



MERLIN AND THE GLEAM. 

I. 

O YOUNG Mariner, 

You from the haven 

Under the sea-clifF, 

You that are watching 

The gray Magician 5 

With eyes of wonder, 

/am Merlin, 

And / am dying, 

/am Merlin, 

Who follow The Gleam. 10 

II. 

Mighty the Wizard 

Who found me at sunrise 

Sleeping, and woke me 

And learn'd me Magic ! 

Great the Master, '5 



Berlin and t\)t ^leam 227 

And sweet the Magic, 

When over the valley, 

In early summers, 

Over the mountain. 

On human faces, 20 

And all around me. 

Moving to melody. 

Floated The Gleam. 

III. 
Once at the croak of a Raven 

who crost it, 
A barbarous people, 25 

Blind to the magic. 
And deaf to the melody, 
Snarl'd at and cursed me. 
A demon vext me. 

The light retreated, 30 

The landskip darken'd. 
The melody deaden'd. 
The Master whisper'd 
' Follow The Gleam.' 

IV 
Then to the melody, 35 

Over a wilderness 
Ghding, and glancing at 
Elf of the woodland, 



228 ^tlttt |^oem0 of ai^enn^0on 

Gnome of the cavern, 

Griffin and Giant, 40 

And dancing of Fairies 

In desolate hollows. 

And wraiths of the mountain. 

And rolling of dragons 

By warble of water, 45 

Or cataract music 

Of falling torrents. 

Flitted The Gleam. 



Down from the mountain 

And over the level, 50 

And streaming and shining on 

Silent river, 

Silyery willow. 

Pasture and plowland. 

Innocent maidens, 55 

Garrulous children. 

Homestead and harvest, 

Reaper and gleaner, 

And rough-ruddy faces 

Of lowly labour, 60 

Slided The Gleam — 

54. 1889 : Horses and oxen ; since omitted. 



^ttiin and tl)e ^leam 229 

VI. 

Then with a melody 

Stronger and statelier, 

Led me at length 

To the city and palace 65 

Of Arthur the king ; 

Touch'd at the golden 

Cross of the churches, 

Flash'd on the Tournament, 

Flickered and bicker'd 70 

From helmet to helmet, 

And last on the forehead 

Of Arthur the blameless 

Rested The Gleam. 

VII. 

Clouds and darkness 75 

Closed upon Camelot ; 

Arthur had vanish'd 

I knew not whither. 

The king who loved me, 

And cannot die ; 80 

For out of the darkness 

Silent and slowly 

The Gleam, that had waned 

to a wintry glimmer 
On icy fallow 
And faded forest, 85 



230 g)eUct l^oetnsf of tETmn^^on 

Drew to the valley 
Named of the shadow, 
And slowly brightening 
Out of the glimmer, 
And slowly moving again to 

a melody 50 

Yearningly tender. 
Fell on the shadow, 
No longer a shadow. 
But clothed with The Gleam. 

VIII. 
And broader and brighter 95 

The Gleam flying onward. 
Wed to the melody. 
Sang thro' the world ; 
And slower and fainter, 
Old and weary, 100 

But eager to follow, 
I saw, whenever 
In passing it glanced upon 
Hamlet or city. 

That under the Crosses 105 

The dead man's garden. 
The mortal hillock, 
Would break into blossom ; 
And so to the land's 
Last limit I came — no 

And can no longer. 



Berlin anu t^e ^leam 231 

But die rejoicing 

For thro' the Magic 

Of Him the Mighty 

Who taught me in childhood, 115 

There on the border 

Of boundless Ocean, 

And all but in Heaven 

Hovers The Gleam. 

IX. 

Not of the sunlight, "o 

Not of the moonlight. 

Not of the starlight 1 

O young Mariner, 

Down to the haven. 

Call your companions, i*S 

Launch your vessel. 

And crovi^d your canvas, 

And, ere it vanishes 

Over the margin. 

After it, follow it, »3o 

Follow The Gleam. 



232 Select poentfif of ©enn^sfon 



CROSSING THE BAR. 

Sunset and evening star, 

And one clear call for me ! 
And may there be no moaning of the bar, 

When I put out to sea, 

But such a tide as moving seems asleep, 5 

Too full for sound and foam, 
When that which drew from out the boundless 
deep 

Turns again home. 

Twilight and evening bell. 

And after that the dark ! 10 

And may there be no sadness of farewell. 

When I embark ; 

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place 

The flood may bear me far, 
I hope to see my Pilot face to face '5 

When I have crost the bar. 



EXPLICIT, 



0om 

Claribel 

A lyric that Tennyson put in the forefront of his battle for fame, 
and ever after retained in the place of honor is well worthy of study. 
The content is slight. In TAe Tempest, Claribel is the fair daughter 
of Alonzo, King of Naples j in 2'/ie Faerie ^eene, she is " a ladie 
fay re of great degree," the mistress of Phaon, whom he is betrayed 
into slaying by the same stratagem that Borachio practised on Clau- 
dio, in Much Ado. Here the theme is simply the aflfecting one Poe 
recommends, a beautiful woman, dead. The musical name implies 
a lovely owner ; but she died long ago j the headstone is moss- 
grown ; grief has been stilled into tender reminiscence. All lovely 
things gather about her resting-place — roses, moon-light, bird-song, 
murmuring wind in the oak-leaves, the ripple of running water. 
Claribel the beautiful has returned to the bosom of the All-Mother, 
like Wordsworth's Lucy; like " My Kate," she has made the 
grass greener with her grave. 

The metre is a bold experiment, following no law, but that of its 
own inward harmony. Coleridge could read this and yet deliver his 
famous criticism about the young poet not very well knowing what 
metre was. Much of its charm lies in the archaic ' th ' for ' s ', a 
euphonious termination which English of the present has unfortu- 
nately lost. In improving his*work, Tennyson tried to '*kick the 
geese out of the boat," — get rid of the sibilants — wherever 
possible. 

Mariana 

The features of this poem are the minute, Wordsworthian obser- 
vation of details, and the artistic selection of those that strengthen 
the central idea — "careless desolation" — within and without the 
lonely moated grange, and in the heart of the lonely deserted woman, 
waiting, expectant, with her hope ever deceived. Tennyson attains 
his effect by iteration ; the burden ** I 'm a-weary," that Bulwer 



234 Jl^ote0 

sneered at, is essential. Such a repetition as the ' ' lonely moated 
grange" in stanzas one and three, assists in the general effect ; as 
does the symbolism of the single poplar tree ; it is alone, as the 
woman is alone ; its shadow falls across her bed. 

True to life is the sleeplessness, the '* broken slepes," which 
Chaucer noted five hundred years ago, in the train of Venus ; and 
the consequent dreamy unreality of the day. Heine puts it all in 
two short quatrains : 

" Morgens steh' ich auf und frage 
Kommt Feinsliebchen heut' > 
Abends sink' ich bin und klage : 
Ausblieb sie auch heut'. 

'■'■ In der Nacht mit meinem Kummer 
Lieg' ich schlaflos, wach ; 
Traumend, wie im halben Schlummer, 
Wandle ich bei Tag." 

Mariana is a lady deserted by Angelo in Measure for Measure. 
Her sad case is only mentioned in the play ; but the single Shaks- 
perean phrase falling like a seed in the rich soil of the later poet's 
imagination blossomed into this poem. 

Recollections of the Arabian Nights 

Galland's decorous version of these wild Oriental tales usually 
called T/ie Arabian Nights'" Entertainments^ influenced European lit- 
erature from their publication in 1704—12. Montesquieu, Voltaire, 
Addison, Goldsmith all felt their influence. Beckford's Vathek is 
a direct imitation. Wordsworth in The Prelude describes his boyish 
delight in an abridgment of them. The " gorgeous East " haunts 
the Northern imagination 5 and Tennyson came under the spell. 
The poem is a young man's dream of beauty,' Keatsian in its sen- 
suousness ; the centre of the picture is naturally the " Persian girl," 
the odalisque. The iteration of the burden recalls and suggests the 
atmosphere of the " Nights." Holman Hunt's design — the lithe 
young Moslem in his shallop, moving down the still river — gives 
the sentiment of the poem. This, for Oriental love of beauty j Fa- 
tima^ for the fire of Oriental passion. 

106. rosaries. Rose-gardens j in Skelton, rose-bushes. 



iPote0 235 

127. mooned domes. The crescent moon is the badge of 
Islam. 

The Dying Swan 

An ideal eclectic landscape, the parts all selected as in Mariana, 
to give the necessary ' atmosphere ' of melancholy. The musical 
note of swans before their death is discussed compendiously in Pseu- 
dodoxia epidemicay bk. 11. cap. xxvii. 

10. "Took" seems to have two meanings. The " weary 
wind" "took," that is, moved, the reed-tops: and the swan's 
death-song also " took " the soul of that waste place with joy. 
This latter must be the Shaksperean sense — enchanted ; as in 
Perdita's unfading nosegay, — 

" daffodils, 
That come before the swallow dares and take 
The winds of March with beauty," 

Tennyson uses it also in the first sense in CEnone. 

" topmost Gargarus 
Stands up and takes the morning." 

Kingsley hailed such poetry as "democratic." His enthusiastic 
appreciation shows how novel Tennyson's method was. 

" Brought up ... in a part of England, which possesses not 
much of the picturesque, and nothing of that which the vulgar call 
sublime, he has learnt to see that in all nature, in the hedgerow and 
the sand-bank, as well as in the alp peak and the ocean waste, is a 
world of true sublimity — a minute infinite — an ever fertile garden 
of poetic images, the roots of which are in the unfathomable and the 
eternal, as truly as any phenomenon which astonishes and awes 
the eye. The descriptions of the desolate pools and creeks where the 
dying swan floated, the hint of the silvery marsh mosses by Mariana's 
moat, came to me like revelations. I always knew there was some- 
thing beautiful, wonderful, sublime in those flowery dykes of Batter- 
sea Fields } in the long gravelly sweeps of that lone tidal shore ; and 
here was a man who had put them into words for me ! This is 
what I call democratic art — the revelation of the poetry which lies 
in common things." 

Alton Locke, IX. 



236 j]^ote0 

The Lady of Shalott 

Tennyson's first excursion into the haunted region of Celtic ro- 
mance. It is a form of the Elaine story, the maiden who dies for 
love of a knight, as told in Malory, bk. xviii, caps 9-20. Tenny- 
son probably found the version used here in Roscoe's Italian Novel- 
ists, 1825. 

Published originally in 1832, this poem was greatly improved in 
the volume of 1842. The weak lines, phrases and stanzas may be 
found in Luce and van Dyke. Mr. Lang has an amusing reference 
to the last verse in Old Friends, Nowhere did Tennyson's habit of 
self-criticism yield better results. 

In Thoughts on Art, p. 75, Hamerton writes : — " This is the 
best and most perfect word picture we have yet come upon. Yet 
there is not one form in it and only the very slightest hint of colour. 
The willows whiten, and the walls and towers are grey ; that is all 
the colouring. Form there is none." Rash as the enterprise may 
seem, I venture to differ from this deliverance. '' River " implies a 
valley and two banks, a sluggish English river with "long fields," 
where the rye and barley run to the sky-line. We cannot think of 
rye and barley growing ■without their distinctive gray-green colour. 
So with " lilies "j the mention of the flower suggests the white and 
gold of the corolla and the flat green leaves. With his general out- 
line sketched, Tennyson fills in the road, the long, bare, unflower- 
ing ribbon of land following the windings of the river. Tillage and 
traffic are both suggested. Perhaps no single epithet could describe a 
medieval town better than " many-towered. " See the exquisite little 
city occupying about a half-inch square at the top of Diirer's " Ritter, 
Tod und Teufel." The city is brought well into the picture, and, 
finally, the island in the river, the centre of interest. Within ten 
short lines, the poet has given us a "great wide country," sketched 
with marvellous clearness, breadth and simplicity. " Peu de moyens, 
beaucoup d'effet." 

14. FlO'wing down. The effect of this burden is subtle ; 
there is a stream of tendency setting towards Camelot ; all things, 
the barges, the shallops, the pages, the girls, the abbots, the lovers, 
the funerals all go doivn to Camelot ; and the stream draws the 
Lady in, at last. 



iPotes? 237 

15. Four gray walls. Again Hamerton seems to me at 
fault. The "form" suggested is most definite, that of the simple 
Norman castle, " peel," or donjon, and Mr.Boughton in his " Road 
to Camelot " has so pictured it. 

71. I am half sick of shadows. The sight of the two 
great realities. Love and Death, weans the Lady from her magic web. 

77. bold Sir Lancelot. In quoting this stanza (^Modern 
Painters, in, 197) , Ruskin prefaces, " A degree of personal 
beauty, both male and female, was attained in the Middle Ages, 
with which classical periods could show nothing for a moment com- 
parable 5 and this beauty was set forth by the most perfect splendour, 
united with grace, in dress, which the human race have hitherto 
invented. The strength of their art-genius was directed in great part 
to this object j and their best workmen and most brilliant fanciers 
were employed in wreathing the mail or embroidering the robe. The 
exquisite arts of enamelling and chasing metal enabled them to make 
the armour as radiant and delicate as the plumage of a tropical bird j 
and the most various and vivid imaginations were displayed in the 
alternations of colour, and fiery freaks of form on shield and crest ; 
so that of all the beautiful things which the eyes of men could fall 
upon, in the world about them, the most beautiful must have been 
a young knight riding out in the morning sunshine, and in faithful 
hope." 

118. In the stormy east-wind- The change in the metre 
coincides with the change of season. It is high midsummer, har- 
vest, when Lancelot rode among the barley sheaves in " the yellow 
field " : it is autumn, the pale yellow woods were waning, when 
the Lady found the boat. 

163. ^Vho is this ? The reader feels that in this poem more 
is meant than meets the ear. The Teutonic intellect seeketh after 
an explanation. Tennyson told Canon Ainger, " It may be a para- 
ble of the poetic nature, clashing with the world"; and Elizabeth 
Barrett so understood it. But this " may be '* the poet's ironic acqui- 
escence in an interpretation he never thought of when he wrote the 
poem. It " may be " nothing of the kind. It ** may be a parable " 
of the mysterious intertwining of human lives. The Lady sees Sir 
Lancelot in a mirror, and it brings the curse on her. All unwit- 
ting what he has done, Lancelot gazes on her dead face and blesses 



238 jpOtf0 

it for its loveliness. No interpretation need be sought any more than 
in The Faerie ^eene, or Christabel ; it is a strange story of a far-off 
age, on Poe's theme, a beautiful woman dead. The part of wisdom 
is to listen like a three-years child. 

Oenone 

Improved by re-writing and minute changes ; for details see van 
Dyke's edition. The blank verse is enriched by the recurrence of a 
''burden," " Oh mother Ida, many-fountain' d Ida, Dear mother 
Ida, harken ere I die ; " which is really a quatrain, and gives the 
blank verse the quality of a song. The *' burden " also divides the 
poem into stanzas. 

Tennyson calls it " Oenone " ; but its true title is *' The Judg- 
ment of Paris," a favorite subject of poets and painters. The merely 
sensual is eliminated by the device of letting the goddesses be seen 
through a woman's eyes ; but the picture loses little of its Titian- 
esque color thereby. It carries on the modern treatment of classic 
legend, which Keats began. It is not the revival of a Greek myth j 
which were impossible ; the Greek myth is used as a mould, or form 
into which is poured the poet's new gold. Not only Athene's 
speech, but Here's conception of power is modern : the bribe of 
Aphrodite is of all time. 

I. a vale in Ida. Tennyson never saw the Troad ; his 
landscape here is really the valley of Cauteretz, which he visited 
with Arthur Hallam in 1830. See Clough's Letters, i, 269. Sept. 
I, l86i. 

8. The long brook falling. 'My father returned from 
the expedition in improved health. From this time forward the 
lonely Pyrenean peaks with " their streaks of virgin snow" . . . 
and the " long brook falling thro' the clov'n ravine," were a con- 
tinual source of inspiration.' Memoir, i, 55. Cf. stanza 46 oi A 
Dream of Fair IVomen . 

16. Paris . . . her playmate. The statement in ApoUo- 
dorus III. 12. 6 is that Paris (Alexandros) married Oenone. Hec- 
tor's marriage with Andromache occurs in the same sentence. 

22. many-fountain 'd Ida. The inseparable epithet of Ho- 
mer ; see Iliad, xiv, 157. 



iliotesf 239 

24. quiet holds the hill. Cf. ** All the air a solemn still- 
ness holds." Gray, Elegy in a Country Churchyard. 

30. My eyes are full. Cf. "Mine eyes are full of tears, my 
heart of grief." Hen. IV, b, ii, 3, 17. 

32. I am all aweary. Also the refrain of " Mariana," 
another deserted woman. 

37. daughter of a River-God. Kebren, a little river of 
the Troad. Oenone was then an Undine. 

41. a cloud that gathereth shape. Cf. *' Anon out of 
the earth a fabric huge Rose like an exhalation." — Par. Losfy 
i, 710, f. 

66. That smelt ambrosially. Like the food of the Gods. 
Milton makes the Attendant Spirit in Comus call his "weeds'* 
"ambrosial." In In Memoriam, Ixxxvi, Tennyson calls air after 
showers, "ambrosial." 

71. " For the most fair." A good statement of the history 
of the whole myth will be found in Gardner, Grammar of Greek 
Art^ cap. XV. 

93. Naked they came. In early Greek art, the goddesses 
are draped. 

108. She to Paris made proffer. In Iphigenia in Aulisy 

Euripides, (1. 1289), represents the goddesses as relying on their in- 
herent qualities, but in the Troades (1. 920), they try as here, to 
bribe the Judge, a truly Oriental and feminine method of deciding a 
disputed point in aesthetics. 

116. mast-thronged. Cf. The Prophecy of Capys^ 

" Where in the still deep water. 

Sheltered from waves and blasts. 
Bristles the dusky forest. 

Of Byrsa's thousand masts." 

128 are likest gods. Cf. Tamburlaine^ 11, v, 57-59. 

" A god is not so glorious as a king. 

I think the pleasure they enjoy in heaven. 
Cannot compare with kingly joys on earth." 



151. Sequel of guerdon. A reward following your de- 
iion. 
158. So that my vigour. That is the force of wisdom 



cision. 



240 Jl^otesf 

joined to his energy. It has been often pointed out that this ideal 
of the growth of character is modern j perhaps Tennyson's own 
ideal. 

1 88. And I was left alone. Cf. the strength given by 
the repetition, as here, of this one word in The Ancient Mariner 
" Alone, alone, all all alone &c." 

204. They came. The Trojan ship-builders, 1 conjecture, 
to cut the timber for the vessel that took Paris to Sparta. 

220. The Abominable. Eris, the goddess of Discord, the 
** fairy god-mother," who takes revenge for not being invited to the 
feast. 

233. hOTV canst thou bear. The same idea in King 
John III, i, 71-73, where Constance enthrones herself upon the 
ground 

*' for my grief 's so great 
That no supporter but the huge firm earth 
Can hold it up : '' 

260. fire dances. This last stanza shows the pagan despair 
at the thought of death with no hope beyond. The * fire ' here and 
in the last line hints at the sack of Troy. 

To 



The poem may have been addressed to Trench or to some imagi- 
nary artist. Though a follower of Keats, Tennyson here protests 
against the central Keatsian doctrine, 

"• Beauty is truth, truth, beauty — this is all 
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." 

Again, *' St. Agnes' Eve," with its ideal of heavenly ecstasy, seems 
intended as a pendant to the intoxicating sensuousness of ** The 
Eve of St. Agnes." 

The Palace of Art 

The poet has given his interpretation of the allegory once in 
verse ( " To " ) 5 ^^^ ^"'-^ ^" prose. *' Trench said to me, 



jliotesf 241 

when we were at Trinity together, ' Tennyson, we cannot live 
in art. ' * The Palace of Art * is the embodiment of my own belief 
that the Godlike life is with man and for man." Memoir^ i, 118. 
There are several references to the interest this poem excited, ibid. 
pp. 85—89. It was much improved in later editions. The poet 
wondered why people treasured the "rubbish" he "shot from" 
his " full-finish' d cantos;" but they do. See Memoir, i, 119 f. 
and van Dyke, The Poetry of Tennyson, p. 33 ff., Luce, p. 128 ff. 

I. I built my soul. Composed at Cambridge, the archi- 
tectural features of the * ' Palace ' ' are all drawn from collegiate 
buildings. The "squared lawns" the fountains, the corridors, the 
cloisters, the stained glass windows, the oriels, the bell-towers could 
all be paralleled in that university town. The Rich Fool said to 
his soul : " Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years. 
Take thine ease ; eat, drink and be merry." 

80. hoary to the wind. The " little grey leaves " of the 
olive, stirred by the wind ; like " willows whiten." 

99. slept St. Cecily. This stanza and the second following 
suggested two very rich and characteristic designs to Rossetti. See 
the Moxon Tennyson of 18^7. 

III. The Ausonian king. Numa Pompilius ; the wood- 
nymph was Egeria. 

115. Indian Cama. Kamadeva, the Eros of Hindu mytho- 
logy ; not the Indian Venus, as Mr. Churton Collins states. 

126. the supreme Caucasian mind. The Aryan, or 
Indo-European ' white ' race, which was thought to have its home 
in the region of the Caucasus. Why Mr. Churton Collins should 
find the " expression obscure," and make it darker by his explana- 
tion is hard to understand. 

157. over these she trod. Symbolic of the Soul's pride 
and aloofness from humanity : she treads underfoot the mosaic 
"of the human tale." 

163. Verulam. The correct title of " Lord Bacon " is Vis- 
count St. Albans and Verulam. This may be regarded as Tennyson's 
protest against the Aristotelians. Dante calls Aristotle, " the master 
of those who know," and Tennyson transfers the title to the father 
of modern science. It is not necessary to suppose, with Churton 
Collins, that " the exigencies of rhyme caused the inapposite substi- 
tution of Bacon for Aristotle." 



242 j^Otf0 

223. The abysmal deeps. A modified phrase of Arthur 
Hallam's : see Remains, 359. The phrase found at least two hostile 
critics ; see Memoir, i, 86. 

241 . shades, enclosing hearts of flame. In the hall of 

Eblis (in Vathek), crowds wander about, each with his right hand 
upon his heart. Each bosom is ''transparent as crystal" ; Each 
heart is " enveloped in flames." *' They went wandering on from 
chamber to chamber, hall to hall, and gallery to gallery ; all with- 
out bounds or limit ; all distinguishable by the same lowering gloom ; 
all adorned with the same awful grandeur ; all traversed by persons 
in search of repose and consolation, but who sought them in vain, 
for every one carried within him a heart tormented in flames," 
p. 144 f. 

255. Circumstance. " Old word for the surrounding sphere 
of the heavens." (Palgrave). 

287. What is there, &c. «* Out of the repentant cry came 
escape from the dread comradeship of her self. I will return to 
humility and to love, to lowly life with men and women. 

' Make me a cottage in the vale,' she said, 
' Where 1 may mourn and pray ; ' 

for * love is of the valley, ' and when love is learned I will return to 
my palace ; for when I love, and return with others there, bringing 
all I love with me to enioy with me — the beauty which turned to 
corruption when I was alone will live in glory." Brooke, Tenny- 
sorjf 90. 

The Lotus-Eaters 

Like so many others, this poem was revised, added to and in 
parts re-written in the edition of 1842, to its great improvement. 
For the variants, see van Dyke. 

The source, the merest suggestion, is in Odyssey, ix. 83 flF, 
When Keats made a poem of a Greek myth, he strove to repro- 
duce it. Tennyson is not content with that aim, or with making a 
beautiful poem. He is incurably "modern," of our own age, and 
he strives to put new content into the old tale. He will not sunder 
the ideal sisterhood, the Good, the True, the Beautiful. The un- 
derlying thought is somewhat the same as in The Palace of Art, the 



jl^ote0 243 

moral wrong of putting aside the responsibilities of life. This treat- 
ment of classic myth is characteristic ; compare Ulysses. •* A warn- 
ing to the drifters and dreamers of this world," p. 120. S, Brooke. 

I. * Courage ! ' he said. Spenser is the poet's poet. Here 
Tennyson has caught the secret of his special stanza, the long sen- 
tence, the linked sweetness long drawn out of the verse-structure, 
and the grammatical clearness. Byron did not. 

3. unto a land. As in The Lady of Shalott, the poet 
sketches here a great, ideal landscape, of Turnerian breadth and 
distance, with a few simple strokes. 

26. dark faces pale. Tennyson has the artist's sensitive- 
ness to the effect of color on color. Cf. Aphrodite's foot shining 
' rosy-white ' against the blue of the violets, in Oenone. 

41. most weary seem'd the sea. The exact opposite of 
the sentiment of Ulysses ; the hero cannot rest from travel. 

Choric Song. 

53. mosses deep. Cf. Faerie S^ueene, 11, xii, 61. 

130. Long labour unto aged breath, &c. These lines 
give the attitude of the weak-willed and self-pitying towards the 
conception of life as duty. The other side of the argument seems to 
have been given intentionally, in Ulysses, 1. 50 '* Old age hath 
yet his honour and his toil," &c. The reasons for shirking are 
drawn from the example of Nature (stanza in), the example of the 
Epicurean gods (stanza viii), the certainty of Death (stanza iv), the 
worthlessness of their achievement, in the end (stanza vi) ; so they 
surrender themselves to the pleasures of contemplation, not action. 
" The slothful man saith there is a lion in the way." The lotus- 
root is a poison. Ulysses dragged his mariners ** beneath the benches 
and bound them in the hollow barques. 

151. RoU'd to starboard. The lift and swing and roll of 
a strong-going vessel in a heavy sea seem to have got into these two 
lines. 

173. Oh rest ye. The thesis was never maintained with 
more fascination and power. 



244 jl^otes? 



A Dream of Fair Women 

Revised and improved by excision in later editions, Tennyson 
advised Browning against "long-backed" poems j and practised 
vi^hat he preached. For omitted stanzas and variants, see van Dyke. 

Regarding the original opening, doctors disagree. The magiste- 
rial Morton Luce considered the poem "quite ruined" thereby: 
FitzGerald thought these stanzas in Tennyson's "best style} no 
fretful epithet, nor a vv^ord too much ; " . . . " they make a per- 
fect poem by themselves without aflFecting the ' dream.' " 

A Dream. Taine says " What first attracted people were Ten- 
nyson's portraits of women." This is the best part of his gallery. 

2. The Legend. Tennyson's direct obligation to Chaucer is 
slight enough ; but the dreaming over a book, the vision of the 
dewy wood, and the gracious figures there are thoroughly Chaucerian. 

3. the morning star. The glory of the dawn, of Genesis, 
"When the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God 
shouted for joy." Job. 

5. Dan Chaucer. * Don,' ' Dom,' 'Dominie,' and 'Dan' 
are all titles of honor from Lat. ' dominus. ' See Faerie ^eene^ 
IV, ii. St. 82 for the first use of the term. Spenser, with his age, 
admired Chaucer greatly. 

43. As when a great thought. Cf. "Stung by the 
splendour of a sudden thought." A Death In The Desert. 

52. the gulfs of sleep. It should be noted that here first 
the poet falls asleep. What has gone before is not a phantasmagoria 
of dream images j but the peculiar experience of illusions hypno- 
gogi^ues. The dream that follows is clear-cut, definite, consistent as 
compared with the swift succession of images melting the one into 
the other which preceded. Tennyson harvested his dreams. 

54. an old 'wood. Chaucer's favorite mise-en-scene. See 
Deth of Blaunche the Duchesse^ Parlement of Foules^ Sec. Joy, more 
than any other painter, has realized the poet's description of the 
wood in his " Dream of Fair Women," exhibited in the Royal 
Academy, 1905. 

77. the smell of violets. It is rare to have a sensation of 
odors in dreams. 



^om 245 

86. stiller than chisell'd marble. The comparison of 
Helen to a statue is natural : we know the art of the Greeks 
chiefly through their sculpture. 

98. such a face. "Is this the face that launched a thou- 
sand ships And burn'd the topless towers of Ilium?" Marlowe, 
Faustus. 

105. I was cut off. Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnon. 

118. I would the white. '* An echo of her words in II. 
VI. 345 : would that on the day when my mother bare me at the 
first, an evil storm-wind had caught me away to a mountain or a 
billow of the loud-sounding sea, where the billow might have swept 
me away before all these things came to pass, and II. iii. 173: 
would that sore death had been my pleasure when I followed thy 
son hither and left my home and my kinsfolk," Mustard, Classical 
Echoes, 9. 

126. a queen v;rith sw^arthy cheeks. " Thus one of our 
most popular poets describes Cleopatra j and one of our most popular 
artists has illustrated the description by a portrait of a hideous grin- 
ning Ethiop. . . . But Cleopatra was a Greek, the daughter of 
Ptolemy Auletes, and a Lady of Pontus. The Ptolemies were 
Greeks, and whoever will look at their genealogy, their coins and 
their medals, will see how carefully they kept their pure Greek blood 
uncontaminated by African intermixture." Peacock, Gryll Grange^ 
cap. XXIII. The artist is Millais. See the Moxon Tennyson of 1857. 
The censure is perhaps deserved. 

132. like the moon. Cf. 

" You have the power, sweet. 
To make me passionate as an April day. 



You are the powerful moon of my sea's blood. 
To make it ebb or flow into my face. 
As your looks change." 

The fVitch of Edmonton^ II, ii. 

141. rode sublime. Cf. Par. Lost, vi, 771, and sonnet 

XIII. 

" And on the neck of crowned Fortune proud 
Hast rear'd God's trophies." 

157- With that she tore. The stanza Millais illustrated 
too faithfully and thereby drew down Peacock's censure. 



246 i^otti 

171. fill'd with light. Cf. Elizabeth Barrett Browning, 

" the smile she softly uses 
Fills the silence like a speech." 

Romance of the Swanks Nest. 
" Such a blue inner light from her eyelids outbroke. 
You look'd at her silence and fancied she spoke." 

A// Kate. 

174. rings. Cleopatra's eyes as burning-glasses. 

177. my sense undazzled. This, the general effect of 
great beauty, is crystallized in the ballad formula *' lady bright." At 
first sight of Juliet, Romeo cries " Oh, she doth teach the torches 
to burn bright," a jewel-like brilliance against the black of night 
and fate. 

179. crested bird. Pace Professor van Dyke, this should be, 
not the cock, but the lark. The * crested lark ' is Theocritan (Id. 
VII, 23) and ornithologists recognize a species, Alauda cristata. 
However, I have in mind Tennyson's rebuke to the ' cockney,' who 
thought that the birds calling * Maud, Maud, Maud,' were nightin- 
gales, and not rooks. As in the case of the Saracen's Head, much 
may be said on both sides. Like the cathedral close and '* the smell 
of violets, hidden in the green," the song of the lark starts no train 
of association for us of the cis-Atlantic world. 

197. the warrior Gileadite. See ^K^^^i xi, 26-40. — ' 

213. my maiden blame. The gloiyof the Eastern woman 
is to bear children. See Judges xi, 37. 

238. Aroer on Arnon. Phrase from Judges xi, 33. Like 
Milton, Tennyson knows the value of place names in sonorous 
effect and historical association. 

251. Rosamond. '*Rosa mundi non Rosa munda " ; the 
daughter of Walter de Clifford and mistress of Henry H. See 
Becket, and Diet. Nat. Eiog. 

259. Fulvia. "The married woman." Queen Eleanor is 
often represented as ofi^ering Rosamond the choice of death by the 
dagger or the bowl of '* poison strong." 

263. captain of my dreams. Venus, the leader of the 
poet's vision of fair women. 

266. her who clasped. Margaret Roper, the daughter of 
Sir Thomas More, executed in the reign of Henry VI H. See 
Diet. Nat. Biog. 



ifiotefif 247 

269. her who knew. Eleanor of Castile, wife of Edward I. 
Millais' illustration of this verse in the Moxon Tennyson of 1857 is 
very fine. 

283. yearnings, "groanings which cannot be uttered." 
Rom. viii, 26. 

285. Because all words. Commentators avoid this stanza: 
but the imagery is not clear : what has the fainting of the heart, 
faded by its (own?) heat, to do with the insipidity of the sweet 
words that do not give the necessary corrective bitter ? Does the 
poet think his words over-sweet ? The withering beneath the palate 
must mean distasteful. Does * heat ' mean passion ? or eagerness to 
realize its thought ? 

To J. s. 

Published as the last in Poems, 1832. Tennyson had "a noble 
and a true conceit Of god-like amity." His friendship with Arthur 
Hallam is only the most famous of many friendships. His poems 
expressing his feelings for FitzGerald, Jebb, Kemble, Spedding, 
Jowett, Maurice, Brookfield, Sir John Simeon, make a fine " gar- 
land." Here he attempts a friend's most difficult office, the con- 
solation of a friend in bereavement. The retarded movement of the 
quatrains is elegiac in effect ; and suggests the metre of In Memo- 
riam, as does the general line of thought. It is a consummate letter 
of sympathy : Hallam thought the lines *' perfect." Memoir, i, 88. 

MoRTE D'Arthur 

This poem seems to have been composed in 1834. Tennyson 
was copying it in October of that year ( Memoir, i, 138.). This 
is the nucleus about which gathered between 1834 and 1885, the 
full-orbed epic, T/ie Idylls of the King. 

The setting is intimately English. After the Christmas games in 
another " Bracebridge Hall," the poet reads to the sleepy parson 
and his host the eleventh book of his lost epic : the others have been 
burnt. In some forty years ( for Tennyson was a man "of long- 
enduring hopes " ) , the great poem stood complete, in twelve books. 
It must have been a pleasure to the poet to build up this great mon- 



248 iI5ote0 



ument about the name of Arthur, the name of his first and dearest 
friend. 

The title and the material come from Caxton's *' noble and joy- 
ous historic." Spenser used the legends in his great allegory, and 
made Arthur typify Magnificence, the sum of the moral virtues, 
much as Tennyson has done. Milton's Cambridge note-book shows 
that he considered the Arthurian cycle as a possible subject for the 
great poem he was training himself to write. Dryden thought of 
doing the same thing, as Scott eloquently laments ; but it was re- 
served for the poet of the nineteenth century to give the great tale 
its final poetic shape. 

Before 1859, there is no evidence of the poet's intention to sur- 
charge his epic with allegory, and shadow Soul at war with Sense. 
He had been content to turn the prose of Caxton into flowing 
blank verse narratives, giving them unity and consistency and raising 
them in tone. 

Adverse criticism hardly goes further than calling his characters 
"dainty," *' Canova-like figures," "drawing-room pictures for 
a ladies' school," and King Arthur an " impeccable prig," Ten- 
nyson does not lack eloquent defenders, — Hutton, Paton, Swin- 
burne } but the real defense is yet to be made. Tennyson did not 
aim at reproducing the " savages of the sixth century," nor the 
knightly ideals of the fifteenth. The Greeks and Romans of Cor- 
neille and Racine do not belong to the palmy days of Greece and 
Rome ; they are the grand seigneurs, and the great ladies of the 
reign of Louis Quatorze. So Tennyson's Enids and Elaines, his 
Lancelots and Gareths are thoroughbred English men and women of 
the early Victorian era. Millais' canvasses preserve their features and 
their noble air. To my thinking, there is much more of Arthur Hal- 
lam in the " blameless King," than the Prince Consort, to quote the 
oft-repeated sneer. From the very first, Arthur has represented the 
ideal of each different poet's age. 

31. clothed in vyhite samite. The German < Sammet,' 
velvet. 

36. Excalibur . . . fling him. Arthur's sword has a name 
and a personality. With primitive peoples, the personal weapon, 
especially the sword, is thought of as alive ; it speaks, sings and 
gives oracles. 



0Ott& 249 

56. diamond sparks. Until 1853, the reading was 'studs,' 
common ornaments of armor : the weaker * sparks ' is due to 
Tennysonian fastidiousness. 

60. This way and that dividing. Translation ofAeneid^ 
iv, 285. For Tennyson's obligations to the classics first and last, see 
Mustard's admirable Classical Echoes in Tennyson. It is the last 
word on the subject. 

222. Not like that Arthur. Cf. Marlowe, Edward Ilf 

V- 5, 

" Tell Isabel, the queen, I looked not thus. 
When for her sake I ran at tilt in France, 
And there unhorsed the Duke of Claremont." 

240. The old order changeth. The Morte D' Arthur 

appeared in 1842, just at the climax of the Oxford movement, the 
Chartist movement and the Corn Law agitation. Parliamentary 
reform and Catholic Emancipation were accomplished facts. The 
** old order " in England was decidedly changed. 

247. " Pray for my soul." A typical Tennysonian change. 
In Caxton, this is simply the usual request of a medieval Catholic j 
but Tennyson enlarges the conception of the efficacy of prayer and 
makes it acceptable to all faithful souls. 

259. island-valley of Avilion. This is the Celtic con- 
ception of the Elysian fields, the opposite of the climate they knew. 
Compare the landscape of Ossian with the fairyland of Kilmeny. 

The Gardener's Daughter 

In his Victorian Poets, Stedman has demonstrated once for all, 
Tennyson's obligations to Theocritus. These obligations, Tenny- 
son himself seems to proclaim in the very title of the poems of 
1 842. English Idylls, then, are to be understood as ' little pictures * 
of English life. There is this diflFerence however between the Eng- 
lish, and the Sicilian poet, that whereas Theocritus deals with an 
incident, Tennyson gives the incident a setting. The Gardener'' s 
Daughter is an excellent example of his method. The idyl proper 
is where Rose is discovered by the two young painters among the 
roses * mingled with her fragrant toil ' ; the narrator asks for a 
flower, and the maiden moves away. It is a very beautiful * little 



250 jliotesf 

picture,' especially appropriate on the lips of a painter. But this is 
only the central incident in the story as told by the old man before 
he draws the veil from the picture of his dead wife. The situation 
is almost the same as in My Last Duchess, but with a difference. 

13. So light of foot. Tennyson recalls the impression of 
youthful grace that Juliet made, not on her lover, but on the pious 
churchman. ' Oh, so light a foot will ne'er wear out the everlast- 
ing flint.' Her light motion of the young thing and the 'white 
wonder ' of her hand are the only two hints of her beauty that Shak- 
spere vouchsafes us. Tennyson's Juliet and Rose are like Shakspere's 
Hermia and Helena, thoroughly English girls ; Juliet is little, dark, 
fairy-like, another Lilia ; Rose is Hebe, with violet eyes and soft 
brown hair. 

28. More black than ash-buds. An example of Tenny- 
son's minutely Wordsworthian observation of Nature. Perhaps too 
minute. See Cranford, iv, for the admiration it could excite. 

33. Not wholly in the busy world. The scenery here 
described, 11. 33-47, is foreign to us ; as is the birdsong in 11. 89-95. 

48. hoarded in herself. Like Wordworth's Lucy. Cf. 

' And vile it were 
For some three suns to store and hoard myself.' 

Ul;sses, 1, 28. 

62. My heart was like a prophet. Cf. The Princess, 

' Immersed in rich foreshadowings of the world 
I loved the woman.' 

83. For those old Mays. It is an old man who speaks, 
* laudator temporis acti.' 

no. gave into. A Gallicism ; * donner sur.' 

115. A cedar spread. Like Tennyson's own famous cedar 
of Lebanon at Farringford under which he wrote Maud. 

132. touched a foot. Of fairy lightness too, like Juliet's. 

140. an old man young. The old men of Troy forgot the 
evils she had brought upon their city, when Helen passed through 
the streets. 

141. a Rose In roses. Cf. 'Queen Rose of the rosebud 
garden of girls,' Maud, xxii. 

152. betwixt this mood. Cf. * This way and that dividing 
the swift mind,' Morte D' Arthur. 



i^ote0 251 

244. The secret bridal chambers. Tennyson had his 
love-letters burnt before his death. Carlyle speaks of ' The Blue- 
beard chambers of the heart.' 

262. Night slid. One thinks of Thorwaldsen's relief, * Night,* 
with the tender child asleep on her shoulder. 

267. Raise thy soul. As in the service j < Sursum corda.' 

Dora 

The source of this poem is ' Dora Creswell,' in Miss Mitford's 
most important work, Our Village, a remarkable series of tran- 
scripts from English rural life. Tennyson modified the original story, 
making Dora a woman instead of a girl, and changing the ending. 

Like The Gardener'' s Daughter, it shows how Tennyson modi- 
fied the Theocritan idyl. The whole story of Dora's life is told 5 
but the idyl proper, the central incident, is Dora sitting on the 
mound with William's boy and the meeting with her uncle. 

The critics are fond of drawing a contrast between the simplicite 
of Wordsworth in Michael, and the simplesse of Tennyson in this 
poemj but Wordsworth said, * Mr. Tennyson, I have been endeav- 
oring all my life to write a pastoral like your " Dora," and have 
not succeeded.' 

22. Then the old man Was wroth. Millais illustrated 
this line and 1. 159 fF. in the 1857 Tennyson. The second design 
at the end of the poem is particularly happy. 

68. sake of him that 's gone. Carlyle notices this peri- 
phrasis for ' died ' in the speech of his own peasant father. " The 
Dead again he spoke of with perfect freedom, only with serious 
gravity (perhaps a lowering of the voice), and always, even in the 
most trivial conversation, adding ' that 's gane' : ' my brother John 
that 's gane' did so and so." Reminiscences, i, 42. 

71. where many poppies grew. Exotic for Americans 
who never see the crimson poppies growing like weeds among the 
yellow grain. Cf. 

" Your ghost will walk, you lover of trees. 
If our loves remain. 
In an English lane. 
With the cornfield-side, a-flutter with poppies," 

Browning, De Gustibus. 



252 jliote0 



and Hood, RutA, 

" On her cheek an autumn flush 
Deeply ripen'd. Such a blush 
In the midst of brown was born, 
Like red poppies grown in corn." 

And ' corn ' has to be translated too. 

77. And the reapers reap'd. This half line constitutes, 
with the following line, a * burden,' which divides the two days 
when Dora went to the field. Note 1. 106 f. 



Ulysses 

The text is remarkable in having escaped revision after publica- 
tion. The suggestion comes from Dante, Inferno, cant, xxvi, 11. 
90-120. Ulysses is in the eighth * bolgia ' of the circle of Hell, 
reserved for evil counsellors. He tells Dante and Virgil, " Neither 
fondness for my son, nor reverence for my aged sire, nor the due 
love which ought to have gladdened Penelope, could conquer in me 
the ardor which I had to become experienced in the world ana 'i> 
human vice and worth. I put out into the deep open sea with but 
one ship, and that small company which had not deserted me. . . . 
I and my companions were old and tardy when we came to that 
narrow pass where Hercules assigned his landmarks. ' O brothers,' 
I said, ' who through a hundred thousand dangers have reached the 
West, deny not this to the brief vigil of your senses that remain — 
experience of the unpeopled world beyond the sun. Consider your 
origin ; ye were not formed to live like brutes, but to follow virtue 
and knowledge.' . . . Night already saw the pole with all its 
stars, and ours so low that it rose not from the ocean floor." 

The poem springs directly from the poet's friendship with 
Hallam. He tells us himself that it was " written soon after Arthur 
Hallam's death, and gave my feelings about the need of going for- 
ward, and braving the struggle of life perhaps more simply than 
anything in In Memoriam.'" Memoir, I, 196. As his practice is, 
Tennyson puts new wine into old bottles. His Ulysses is not Ho- 
mer's shifty Greek, nor Dante's evil counsellor, nor Arnold's * spare, 
dark-featured, quick-eyed stranger.' Ulysses is a modern tempera- 
ment, a noble one, which was also frequent at the Renaissance, and 



jpotefif 253 

leads men through strange Odysseys of the soul. The poem, which 
celebrates the dignity and heroism of age, was written by a young 
man in his twenties ; but there is no grief so deep as the grief of 
generous youth. It is hard to read this poem aloud without feeling 
that unreasonable catch in the throat. Of lines 62-64, Carlyle 
wrote, "These lines do not make me weep, but there is in me 
what would fiU whole Lachrymatories as I read," Memoir^ I, 214. 

50. Old age hath yet. The exact opposite of the sentiment 
of The Lotus-Eaters^ 1. 130. 

55. Come, my friends. As has been pointed out, this feel- 
ing of comradeship is modern, such as one of Nelson's captains 
might have had for a proven crew. 

St. Agnes' Eve 

Tennyson mentions this poem in a letter to J. Spedding in 1834: 
see Memoir, I, 142. As an ^pression of religious ecstasy at the 
contemplation of the Vision Beatific, this poem seems intended as a 
pendant to the revel of the senses in The E-ve of St. Agnes. The 
lives of the saints, the life of Theresa, furnish abundant material. 
Millais' design represents the nun going up a turret stair, taper in 
hand. Through a narrow window are seen the convent roofs laden 
with snow and bathed in moonlight. 

Sir Galahad 

Another grave sweet melody of 1834. See Memoir, I, 139. 
A favorite theme of young poets is the time of April blood, the 
intoxication of the senses, the surrender to passion. Only a few 
have been fitted by their lives to celebrate the sage and serious doc- 
trine of virginity. John Milton, another Cambridge man, fresh 
from the university, gave it honor and immortal praise in Comus. 
Milton's Lady and Tennyson's Knight are a worthy pair : but the 
man as man, as militant, as adventurer, comes nearer the range of 
our poor sympathies. The poem, like St. Agnes^ E-ve, is a vivid 
portrayal of religious ecstasy. There is an abiding sense of the 
Divine Presence, such as led Chinese Gordon through a life of 



254 iPote0 

shocks to a hero's death in the city he could not save : at times it 
passes over into rapture. 

In the Morte d' Arthur, the Sangreal or Holy Grail is the vessel 
which held the wine at the Last Supper, and in which Joseph of 
Arimathea caught our Saviour's blood at the crucifixion. It was 
brought by him to Glastonbury. The legend of the quest Ten- 
nyson elaborated in the seventh Idyll of the King, The Holy Grail. 
His point of view has altered in the mean time : he makes the quest 
mischievous as making the knights neglectful of duty : the most 
follow wandering fires : Galahad attains, but he is lost to earth. 

32. the tapers burning fair. The difficulties presented 
to the illustrator by this and the four following lines were trium- 
phantly overcome by Rossetti in a most beautiful design for the 
Moxon Tennyson of 1 857. Not only the purity and strength of 
Galahad's face, but the suggestion of the supernatural by means 
of the hidden angelic choir, is masterly. No part of the block is 
wasted : in the little triangle above Galahad's shield, you see his 
charger tethered to a forest tree, " between dark stems." 

69-72. This passage describes the ecstatic state, a familiar expe- 
rience of Tennyson himself. "A kind of waking trance I have 
frequently had, quite up from boyhood, when I have been all alone. 
This has generally come upon me thro' repeating my own name 
two or three times to myself silently, till all at once, as it were out 
of the intensity of the consciousness of individuality, the individuality 
seemed to dissolve and fade away into boundless being, and this not 
a confused state, but the clearest of the clearest, the surest of the 
surest, the weirdest of the weirdest, utterly beyond words, where 
death was an almost laughable impossibility, the loss of personality 
(if so it were) seeming no extinction but the only true life." 
"This might," he said, " be the state which St. Paul describes, 
' Whether in the body I cannot tell, or whether out of the body 
I cannot tell.' " Memoir, I, 320. Cf. The Ancient Sage and In 
Memoriam, xcv. 9. 

Edward Gray 

This has been described as "a pretty, homely ballad of the type 
of * Barbara Allen,' but much refined." It is a song of two heart- 



jliote0 255 

breaks, a long story of love and sorrow told ballad-fashion by a 
master in thirty-six short lines, vivid, moving, impossible to forget. 
The simplicity, the passion, the perfection of the verse as verse, 
even the quaint detail of writing on the stone, which some critics 
boggle at, recall Heine at his best. 

Millais' design is touching and wonderfully true to the actual 
words as well as the sentiment of the poem. 

The Lord of Burleigh 

A short unemotional paragraph m Burke's Peerage gives the 
necessary outlines from which the intelligent reader can construct 
the whole story. Henry Cecil, tenth earl of Exeter, was born in 
1754. He married thrice. By his first marriage, with Emma, 
only daughter and heir of Thomas Vernon, Esq., of Hanbury, 
county Worcester (from whom he was divorced in 1 791), he had 
no surviving issue. In October of the same year he married Sarah, 
daughter of Thomas Hoggins (with no < Esquire '), of Bolas, 
County Salop. She died in 1797. In 1800 the marquess married 
a third time, and died four years later. Sarah Hoggins's eldest 
son, Brownlow, became the second marquess of Exeter. Her second 
son, Thomas, became a colonel in the army, and married a sister of 
the Duke of Richmond. Her daughter, Sophia, died in 1823. 

The poem is on the same plan as The Gardener'' s Daughter and 
Dora. The central incident, the idyl proper, is the wedding jour- 
ney from the village altar to Burleigh House. Her life before this 
incident is implied and her after life summarized. 

79. The burthen of an honour. Tennyson wrote this be- 
fore marriages between English peers and American girls were com- 
mon. It would be almost impossible for a girl brought up under 
democratic conditions to feel this ' burthen ' ; but an English girl of 
Sarah Hoggins's rank in life would still be unequal to it. 

The Voyage 

The English are an island people, and as a consequence their lit- 
erature is full of the sea. It is also rich in allegory. The Voyage is 



256 ^ott& 

a sea-poem and a parable of human life. The crew of the ship are 
one generation of men, in ceaseless progression, in constant pursuit 
of the Vision that flies before, — Fancy, or Virtue, or Knowledge, 
or Heavenly Hope, or Liberty They will never attain, but in 
spite of cynic jibes and crippling age, they will never abandon the 
chase. 

4. fleeted to the South. This is the general course of the 
ship of the Ancient Mariner. 

73. only one among US. The inevitable critic, — Carlyle, 
perhaps. 

77. " A ship of fools." Sebastian Brandt wrote a long sat- 
ire, Der Narrenschiff^ which was freely translated into English by 
Alexander Barclay, and published by him in 1509, under the title 
The Ship of Folys of the Worlde. 

86. whence were these. Physical force is not the only 
motive power in the world. Spiritual forces play their part as well. 

The Vision of Sin 

The sin of which the young poet has his vision is not all sin, 
the sin of the world, such as Milton embodied in his woman-snake 
portress of Hell Gate, but the sin of youth that filled the second 
great circle of the Inferno with countless multitudes. In the phys- 
ical world there is no forgiveness of this (or any other) sin. Its in- 
evitable consequences are disillusionment, cynicism, disbelief in all 
things high. Burns, who ought to know, says : 

" I waive the quantum o' the sin. 
The hazard of concealing ; 
But, och ! it hardens a' within. 
And petrifies the feeling." 

The two parts of the poem are two contrasted revels : the first, 
a Bacchic orgy in a palace to unearthly music ; the second, a de- 
liberate senile debauch in a ruined inn, the Dragon on the Heath, 
to the wicked staves of the slipshod waiter. The contrast is em- 
phasized in point after point, even to the difference in the metres. 

3. He rode ahorse with wings. Pegasus. The 'youth.' 
is a gifted nature, a poet, not a mere sensualist. Cf. Maud, iv. 7, 



jpotr0 257 

* The passionate heart of the poet is whirl'd into folly and vice.' 

His death song, though pessimism absolute, is poetic. 

17. Low voluptuous music. One of the few good descrip- 
tions of the indescribable, — music ; comparable to Milton's in 
V Allegro. 

31. Purple gauzes. Youthful passion described symbolically 
in terms of music and color. It is not quite clear whether the 
music affects the fountain, or simply passes over into color. 

67. Bitter barmaid. Mr. Edmund J. Sullivan has several 
remarkable designs for this part of the poem, amounting to a pic- 
torial interpretation of it. The waiter and the man as lean as death 
make merry over a bowl of punch. At first, the servant keeps a 
respectful distance from the guest, his social superior. At last, they 
are arm in arm and the waiter, in trying to fill the guest's glass 
with the punch-ladle, spills the liquor on the table. This is the stage 
of 'maudlin gall,' when toast after toast has been drunk in mock- 
ery. 

103. Name and fame. A cynical summary of the activities 
of man, like the mournful summary in Vastness. 

141. the hue of that cap. The honnet rouge of the French 
Revolutionists. The goddess of Liberty on the U. S. coinage wears 
one. The old debauchee and cynic is evidently a Tory. 

189. Buss me. Sullivan represents a skeleton, with long hair 
adhering to the skull, kissing the man as lean as death. 

224. God made himself. Tennyson was perfectly within 
his rights in declining to explain this line to Tyndall. The artist is 
permitted to create his own mystery. See Memoir, 11, 475. Here, 
as in In Memoriamy lv, the poet faintly trusts the larger hope. Se : 
Memoir y i, 322. 

Break, Break, Break 

Date of composition uncertain : "made in a Lincolnshire lane 
at 5 o'clock in the morning between blossoming hedges." Me- 
moir ^ I, 190. One of the earliest attempts to express the desolation 
which overwhelmed the poet upon the death of Arthur Hallam, 
a fore-runner of /« Memoriam. The sound of the sea upon the 
shore is melancholy when it is not terrifying. The sense of the un- 



258 iI5ote0 

utterable oppresses great hearts, at times; especially in the presence 
of mountains, the sea, death. Shakspere makes Cleopatra in her 
last hour have " immortal yearnings." Madame Roland on the 
scaffold wishes for a pen to write down the thoughts that arose in 
her. The pictures so deftly suggested of the children on the shore, 
the merry sailor in his boat, the procession of tall ships with their 
tiering canvas, bring out by contrast the infinite sadness of the sea, — 
the sea, that separates like death. 

II. Touch of a vanished hand. Cf. In Memoriam, vn. 



Doors, where my heart was used to beat 
So quickly, waiting for a hand," 



and ibid, x. 



" And hands so often clasp'd in mine 

Should toss with tangle and with shells," 

also ibid. XIII, 6, 7, and cxix, 12. 

Songs from The Princess 

The 'poems' of Tennyson which in 1830 first caught the ear 
of the discerning were 'chiefly lyrical.' In the last years of his life, 
he could write such a genuine lilt as The Throstle, delightful fruit 
off an old tree. It has been the fashion lately to disparage his songs 
as artificial and sophisticated. If it were so, it were a grievous 
fault : but this disparagement is simply the reaction against former 
praise. His songs have not only a ravishing " Doric delicacy," but 
they can be, and are, sung. They are not only verbal melodies re- 
vealing unsuspected possibilities in our " harsh grunting Northern 
guttural ;" but the sentiment rings true; and they are rich in sug- 
gestion and picture. The total impression is clear; there is no 
quaint phrase to catch the ear and fix the attention on itself to the 
effacement of the neighboring lines. The songs between the parts 
of The Princess were an afterthought of the poet. They all point 
to the child, as the centre of the poem, the real heroine ; and 
at times they catch up the sentiment of the narrative, as " Under 
the greenwood tree " catches up the sentiment of As Tou Like 
It. 



i^ote0 259 

The Falling Out 

Picture is suggested in the phrase " thro' the land." It calls up 
great spaciousness of hai-vest fields, and the foot-path alongside. 
In contrast to the breadth of earth and sky is the grave of the 
child in the churchyard, wherein is buried all unkindness. The 
first child of Tennyson was born dead, like the first child of The 
Grandmother. 

Lullaby 

A song of what all the world, Catliolic or not, worships, — the 
Madonna, — a mother hushing her child to sleep on her breast. 
From her cottage on the cliff, the mother can see the moonlight 
on the waters and the silver sails. The west wind which fans her is 
bringing the father home to the babe in the nest. 

Bugle Song 

This song was inspired by the scenery and echoes of Killarney, 
which Tennyson visited in 1842 and 1848. Aubrey de Vere 
(^Memoir, i, 292 f . ) explains in picturesque prose how true it is in 
local color ; but it need not be. For those who never have seen 
Killarney, the lyric has power to conjure up some wide Turnerian 
landscape of snowy peaks and castles and cataracts, full of beauty 
and haunted by the expectancy of further beauty about to be revealed, 
like the Queen of Fairies with all the horns of Elfland in her train 
on some far summit. Dawson explains : 

" Our echoes rpll from soul to soul 
And grow for ever and for ever." 

The stress of the meaning is on the word groiv. The song is evi- 
dently one of married love, and the growing echoes reverberate from 
generation to generation, from grandparent to parent and child. 
Once more it is unity through the family. 

10. horns of Hlfland. Scott brings these eerie horns into 
Marmion (v, xxiv) and sets them blowing with striking effect. 

'•^ They heard a faint yet shrilly tone. 
Like distant clarion feebly blown. " 



26o jpOtr0 

Idle Tears 

There must be some strange charm in the scenery of the * syl- 
van Wye ' to inspire two poets like Wordsworth and Tennyson 
with Tintern Abbey and Idle Tears. " It was written at Tintern 
when the woods were all yellowing with autumn seen through the 
ruined windows. It is what I have always felt even from a boy, 
and what as a boy I called the ' passion of the past.' And so it 
is always with me now j it is the distance that charms me in the 
landscape, the picture and the past, and not the immediate to-day in 
which I move. ' ' Tennyson to James Knowles, Nineteenth Century ^ 
Jan., 1893. 

It is a characteristic effort of the romantic genius to express the 
inexpressible. Tennyson said : ** It is in a way like St. Paul's 
* groanings that cannot be uttered.'" The suggestion of sadness 
comes from a sight that is anything but sad, — '* the happy autumn 
fields." The ordinary mind goes no further than the thought of 
plenty, the long labor of the husbandman in sun and rain crowned 
with fruition ; but the sight plays on the poet's sensitive soul. Mrs. 
Browning makes the Eden spirits sing to Adam and Eve as they 
are driven from the Garden, 

" In all your music, our pathetic minor 
Your ears shall cross ; 
And all good gifts shall mind you of diviner 
With sense ofloss.^^ 

This is precisely the idea : the good gift of harvest reminds of 
diviner, something lost and gone for ever, the past. Tennyson supplies 
both the poem and the best and briefest criticism upon it, *' the 
passion of the past." Each aspect of the past, 'fresh,' * sad,' 
'strange,' 'dear,' 'sweet,' is illustrated by a most illuminating 
comparison. 

This rimeless blank verse lyric in which the absense of rime is 
never noted, because of the perfect rhythms, is a contribution to 
English song peculiarly Tennyson's. 

North and South 

The attraction of the South — the land of summer — for the 
genius of the North is exemplified in a thousand instances, from 



0Ott^ 261 

the wanderings of the Goths, and the Varangers taking service in 
Byzantium to the Italian journeys of Goethe and Winckelmann, 
and the fatal pilgrimages of Keats, and Shelley, and Byron. Heine 
puts it all in two immortal quatrains, ** Ein Fichtenbaum steht 
einsam." The fir-tree's dream of the palm is a universal symbol. 
This too is a rimeless poem in which the perfection of rhythm 
makes the reader forget that there is no rime. 

The Call to War 

This intercalary song strikes the keynote of the following war- 
like canto. Here again, the Child sways destiny. It is the sight of 
the brood about the mother's knee that nerves the warrior to 
victory. In that splendid army which broke the pride of France in 
one short summer month of 1870, there was no more terrible force 
than the married men, the Landivehr. 

The Call to Life 

Again the influence of the Child is celebrated. The sight of 
** his " child not only breaks the widowed mother's trance of 
grief; it gives her the blessed relief of tears and also the courage to 
live. The lyric embodies universal truth. Compare the words of 
the old chatelaine in De Maupassant's most moving story, *' Apres." 
Tennyson improved on Scott's version. See The Lay of the Last 
Minstrel, canto I, sta. 9. The artist's power is manifest in mak- 
ing the few plain lines of unforced ballad measure tell a long story 
and suggest the atmosphere of the middle ages, — feud, sudden 
calamity, stupefying sorrow, maidens in the bower, warriors in the 
hall. You look twice to make sure that there are only four stanzas 
of four lines each. 

Male and Female created He Them 

Tennyson's contribution to the discussion of the question whether 
woman shall continue a parasitic existence, dependent on father, 
brother, or husband, or whether she shall have the right to live 
her own life, not necessarily dependent on man. The poet recks 



262 jliote0 

his own rede and avoids the falsehood of extremes. He would 
preserve all that is valuable in the old order and reach out to all 
that is promising in the new. The married state is, however, the 
ideal. Tennyson lived to see provision made for the education of 
women almost as ample as that sketched in The Princess. 

3. out of Lethe. Not, I venture to think, " the period 
of oblivion before birth," but the incredible period of oblivion and 
development before history began its record. 

6. Stays all this fair young planet. Is the mainstay, 
the determining influence of life everywhere. 

56. one thro' whom I loved her. His mother. Cf. 
Isabely another filial tribute. 

Ode on the Death of the Duke of 
Wellington 

A rare instance of an official ode that is also a poem. The in- 
spiration was genuine, for Wellington was the hero of the nation, 
He had beaten Napoleon and saved England. He was only forty- 
five at Waterloo, and during the last forty-seven years of his life, 
he was much in the public eye. Tennyson saw him only once. 
Carlyle the iconoclast, saw him at a ball in Bath House in 1850 
and grew enthusiastic. " I had never seen till now how beautiful, 
and what an expression of graceful simplicit}', veracity, and noble- 
ness there is about the old hero when you see him close at hand. 
. . . Eyes beautiful light blue, full of mild valour, with in- 
finitely more faculty and geniality than I had fancied before ; the 
face wholly gentle, wise, valiant, and venerable. . . . He glided 
slowly along, slightly saluting this and that other, clear, ciean, 
fresh as this June evening itself, till the sUver buckle of his stock 
vanished into the door of the next room, and I saw him no more." 
Carlyle' s Life In London, 11, 48 f. Wellington at one end of the 
scale, the old style northern farmer at the other, are one in their 
devotion to duty, one of the soundest traits in British character. 
Has Duty been deified by any other nation as in Wordsworth's Ode, 
or in Nelson's last signal at Trafalgar? 

The various readings of this poem illustrate how carefiil and 



j^Ott& 263 

minute was Tennyson's self-criticism. Through the courtesy of 
Professor Henry van Dyke, I am permitted to reproduce them 
here. 

28, clearest of ambitious crime. It surprised Euro- 
pean observers that Wellington, the man on horseback, did not 
make himself a military dictator ; just as fifty years later Grant 
surprised them by resigning his huge command and retiring into 
civil life. 

42. World-victor's victor. Le vainqueur du vainqueur 
du monde. 

55. the towering car. May still be seen in the chapel 
of St. Paul's with the long list of Wellington's battles on it. 

80. who is he. Nelson's question : buried in St. Paul's. 

122. Duty's iron crown. This is the recurrent burden of 
Tennyson's praise. 

172. He bade you guard. ** His last important service was 
a letter upon the defenceless state of the south coast, addressed to 
Sir John Burgoyne, which had great results." 

217. God Himself is sun. *' And the city had no need of 
the sun, neither of the moon to shine in it j for the glory of God 
did lighten it ; and the Lamb is the light thereof." Rev. xxi, 23. 

246. we refrain From talk of battles. The note of 
" Recessional." 

Northern Farmer. Old Style 

Written in Feb., 1861, and published with Enoch Arden, 1864. 
The farmer was not Baumber of the moated grange at Somersby, 
but a character imagined from the dying words of an old-world farm- 
bailiff, as reported to Tennyson by a great-uncle, — " God A' mighty 
little knows what he's about, a-taking me. An' squire will be so 
mad an' all." 

The old pagan is on his death-bed : he has lived his life and passes 
it over in review. Religion meant going to church and patiently 
enduring the parson's meaningless " bummin'," the payment of 
tithe and poor-rate, and voting always on the side of the squire. 
*' Godamoighty" is simply a Being who interferes tyrannically with 
his settled habits and plans. He has however a very real religion, — 



264 il^oteflf 

a religion of duty. He has done his duty by the parson, by the land, 
by the Squire, by the doubtful *' barne " of Bessy Marris, — in fact, 
he has done his duty by all. He can look back on the accomplish- 
ment of a great life-work, the reclaiming of Thurnaby waste : and 
he is not afraid to compare that achievement with the parson's 
one sermon a week : for has he not made two leaves of grass grow 
where one grew before .■* He awaits the opening of the door with- 
out fear, but with a certain annoyance at thoughts of the inconve- 
nience that his death will cause Squire, of the innovations that may 
come upon the land, and of the foolishness of the teetotal doctor 
setting up his opinion on ale against the tested rules of thirty years. 
Pitiful no doubt is this antique loyalty to an employer and devotion 
to his interests : pitiful and obsolete. Obsolete like the dialect seems 
to be the worship of duty as duty : but it made England what she was. 

The Daisy 

Written in 1853, published with Maud in 1855. -^ charming 
record of impressions de 'voyage of an actual poet upon his wedding- 
journey ; illustrating once more the call of the South to the genius 
of the North. The prose version is given in a letter of Mrs. Tenny- 
son's : see Memoirs and Correspondence of Coventry Palmare , 11, 
306. 

1 3- slender campanili : bell-towers, not bell-flowers, though 
" grew " and the last lines of the stanza might seem to indicate possi- 
ble confusion with "campanula." 

23. Cogoletto. Near Genoa : supposed to be the birthplace 
of Columbus. 

37. That hall. The Palazzo Ducale at Genoa. Apparently 
Tennyson saw only plaster and wicker effigies of the grave severe 
Genovese, as the French had destroyed the originals. 

43. Cascine. The Park at Florence. 

" You remember down at Florence our Cascine 
Where the people on the feast days walk and drive." 

Mrs. Browning, The Dance. 

44. Boboli : The beautiful gardens at the rear of the Pitti Pal- 
ace. 



jliote0 265 

75- Virgilian rustic measure. This passage " alludes to 

the episode in praise of Italy, Georgics ii, 159, 

"Anne lacus tantos; te, Lari Maxume, teque, 
fluctibus et fremitu asurgens Benace marine > " 

— " or (shall I speak) of those mighty lakes ; of thee, Larius, the 
greatest, and thee, Benacus, heaving with the swell and the roar of 
the ocean?" (Mustard). "Among the many metres which 
Tennyson invented, he was especially proud of that of * The Daisy,' 
which he called * a far-off echo of the Horatian Alcaic. ' ' ' Memoir, 
I, 341. (Mustard). 

78. the Lariano. " The Latin name of Lake Como was Lacus 
Larius; hence the name of the steamboat." Van Dyke. 

79. that fair port. Varenna, on the eastern shore of Como, 

80. Theodolind. Theodolinda, the beautiful and pious daugh- 
ter of Garibald king of Bavaria. For her romantic story, see Gib- 
bon, Decline and Fall, cap. xlv. Menzel, History of Germany, 
Lxxxix, and George Meredith, The Song of ^een Theodolinda. 

Will 

Published in Maud, and Other Poems, 1855. A thoroughly Eng- 
lish glorification of Horace's '* Justum ac tenacem propositi virum," 
showing also the other side of the medal, the degeneration of the 
weak in will. Scott, writhing in agony on a sofa, but dictating 
Ivanhoe, or sitting down, an old man, broken in mind and body, 
to write off his tremendous debts, is an illustration of the first verse, 
Coleridge, never finishing his poems, a slave to opium, leaving his 
tavern scores for gin-and-water unpaid, leaving his wife and children 
to be supported by his brother-in-law, Southey, is an illustration of 
the second. 

6. Who seems a promontory of rock. A not uncom- 
mon simile ; cf. Iliad, xv, 618-621 ; Aeneid, vii, 586-590; 
and Marcus Aurelius, iv, 49. ** Be like a promontory, against which 
the waves are always breaking. It stands fast and stills the waters 
that rage around it." 

20. The city sparkles. Tennyson sets the city, the goal 
of the traveller in the desert, on a hill, above the level of the plain. 



266 jpotefif 

It shows merely as a small white sparkle at the immeasurable dis- 
tance. The weak-willed never attain to it. 

Wages 

More than any other poet of the nineteenth century, Tenny- 
son has shown in his work understanding of the new scientific 
conceptions that seem to press so heavily upon the Christian reli- 
pon, and yet he clung passionately to the central Christian doctrine 
of immortality. The first two lines embody a thought he often 
expresses; the pettiness of man and human destiny, with "sullen 
Lethe rolling doom " on all things here, a thought to paralyze all 
effort. Virtue, — the Good, — must be immortal ; he believes 
and asserts, without being able to prove. The thought in the 
second stanza is the same as in CEnone, *'And because right is 
right, to foUow right Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence." 
*' I cannot but think moral good is the crown of man. But what 
is it without immortality ? Let us eat and drink for to-morrow we 
die. If I knew the world were coming to an end in six hours, 
would I give my money to a starving beggar? " (J. A. Symonds 
in Tie Century ^ May, 1893.) 

The Higher Pantheism 

Mentioned as written, in Mrs. Tennyson's Journal for Dec. I, 
1867 : ** He brought down to me his psalm-Uke poem, ' Higher 
Pantheism.'" Memoir, 11, 48. "Tennyson now took Barnes 
and me to his top-room." Darwinism, Man from Ape, would 
that really make any difference ? ' ' "(Time is nothing ( said T. ) : are 
we not all part of Deity?" "Pantheism," hinted Barnes, who 
was not at ease in this sort of speculation. ' ' Well ' ' says Tenny- 
son, " I think I believe in Pantheism, of a sort." Memoir, i, 514. 
Pantheism ' ' regards the finite world as simply a mode, limitation, 
part, or aspect of one eternal absolute Being ; and of such a nature 
that from the standpoint of this Being no distinct existence can be 
attributed to it. ' ' The * * Higher ' ' pantheism is a re-statement of 
Christian doctrine, God immanent in the universe, but transcending 
it, God ruling and Man, the subject, apart from God, but able to 



^Ott& 267 

enter into relation with Him. (Compare Wordsworth, Tin tern 
Abbey.) Tennyson was deeply interested in such problems. The 
Metaphysical Society owed its existence to him. All shades of belief 
were represented in it from Ultramontanes like Cardinal Manning 
and "Ideal" Ward to agnostics like Huxley and Comtists like 
Frederic Harrison. This poem was read at the first meeting, at 
the Deanery, Westminster, June 2, 1869. See Memoir^ 11, 166- 
172. 

2. The Vision of Him. What Carlyle, quoting the speech 
of the Erdgeist in Faust (^Sartor Resartus, bk. I, cap. viii) calls 
" the living visible Garment of God." 

8. That which has power to feel * I am I.* Com- 
pare, *' With men of a speculative turn, . , . there come seasons, 
meditative sweet yet awful hours, when in wonder and fear you 
ask yourself that unanswerable question : who am / ; the thing 
that can say '< I " {^das Wesen das sich ICH nennt)}'' Sartor 
Resartus, bk. i, cap. viii j and In Memoriam, xlv. 

" The baby new to earth and sky. 
What time his tender palm is prest 
Against the circle of the breast. 

Has never thought that '• this is I.' " 

10. making Him broken gleams. Cf. In Memoriam^ 

proem. 

" Our little systems have their day ; 

They have their day and cease to be : 
They are but broken lights of thee, 
And thou, O Lord, art more than they." 

15. no God at all. "The fool hath said in his heart, 
There is no God." Ps. liii. 

17. the ear of man. Cf. I Cor.^ ii, 9. 
In Memoriam 

This poem was published in Tennyson's Golden Year, 1850, the 
year of his marriage and of his appointment to be Poet Laureate ; 
but the first " elegies " were written in 1833, soon after Hallam's 
death. It has been censured as portraying a morbid and exagger- 
ated grief J but many a mourner has turned to it instinctively for 



268 jpote0 

the expression of his sorrow and has not found that expression over- 
wrought. It has been called pessimistic and sceptical 5 but closer 
study shows almost anxious adherence to the historic lines of Chris- 
tian belief. 

The poem might be approached in many ways ; but I have 
chosen to regard it as a monument of friendship. Those parts that 
deal with the relations between Tennyson and Hallam have been 
put in the forefront, in the hope that they may appeal to young and 
generous natures. " All the world loves a lover," says Emerson : 
he might have added ' ' and a loyal friend. ' ' The record of this 
most famous of college friendships should attract the young to the 
poem as a whole. There will be time enough for study of other 
parts. The great problem raised by the death of a friend is sug- 
gested only in the broadest outline. The system of things seems 
pitiless, and militates against belief in a life after this life : but the 
instinctive protest of the affections is a force to be reckoned with ; 
and, in the end, the mourner attains to peace and a confidence 
not to be shaken. 

The commentaries on In Memoriam are very many. The two 
most elaborate studies are John F. Genung's Tennyson'' s In Memo- 
riam : Its Purpose and Structure, and Thomas Davidson's Prole- 
gomena to In Memoriam. The poet himself supplies the key to 
the poem : "It was meant to be a sort of Di'vina Commedia, ending 
with happiness. The sections were written at many different places, 
and as the phases of our intercourse came to my memory and sug- 
gested him, I did not write them with any view of weaving them 
into a whole or for publication, until I found that I had written so 
many. The different moods of sorrow as in a drama are dramati- 
cally given, and my conviction that fear, doubts and suffering will 
find answer and relief only through Faith in a God of Love." 
Memoir, i, 304 f. 

Love Victorious 

This proem is dated 1849 and represents for Tennyson, the con- 
clusion of the whole matter. It is at once a creed and a prayer. 
The strong Son of God is Christ, the Maker of all things. The 
heart of the universe is immortal love. 

5. orbs of light and shade. The sun and moon. 



jl^otefif 269 

19. broken lights of thee. The ** little systems" are 
only transient flashes, fragmentary parts, of the full and perfect 
light, the complete truth. 

22. things Mve see. To (paivS/ncva. 

28. as before. As in the ages of faith. 

42. wasted youth. Laid waste by affliction. 

The Friend^ the Heart of all Things 

II. a dream of good. The dream is a dream of moral 
good. The poet's relation to his friend informs his outlook on 
the world, his whole philosophy. 

Burial at Clevedon 

Arthur Hallam died suddenly at Vienna, September, 1833, and 
the body was brought back to England foF burial. '* They chose 
his resting-place in a tranquil spot on a lone hill that overhangs the 
British Channel. He was buried in the chancel of Clevedon Court, 
in Somerset, by Clevedon Court, which had been his mother's 
early home. ... In all England there is not a sweeter place than 
the sunny old court upon the hill with its wide prospects and grassy 
terraces. ' ' 

College Re-visited 

Tennyson and Hallam entered the same college, Trinity, the 
largest in Cambridge, in 1828. Tennyson left in 1831, after the 
death of his father j but Hallam remained until 1832 and took his 
degree. 

4. tumult of the halls. **HaH" is the dining-hall of the 
college: examinations are held there. See Ruskin's Praeterita, i, 
cap. xi. 

20. crash 'd the glass. Tossed their wine-glasses over their 
shoulders, after emptying them, that they might never be used to 
honor a less worthy toast. See Kipling, The Man Who IVas. 

21. a band. Tennyson was a member of "The Apostles," a 
club of young fellow-students, who, nearly all, rose to distinction. 
Knowles is the authority for the statement that Tennyson here 



270 jl^otr0 

referred to the " Water Club," so called because no wine was 
used. 

36. The God "within him. The literal meaning of " enthu- 
siasm." 

40. the bar of Michael Angelo. The well-known por- 
trait of this supreme artist is almost in profile and shows a heavy 
frontal ridge, just over the eye-brows. The same feature appears 
in the Chantrey bust of Hallam. In physical appearance, the two 
friends were a complete contrast ; both were about six feet, but 
Hallam was the fair Saxon type, while Tennyson was dark as an 
Indian. 

Holidays at Somersby 

An intimate picture of refined and cultured English life. The 
poet for the time forgets his grief in remembering happier things. 
Hallam was engaged to Miss Emily Tennyson, then only seventeen. 
He taught her Italian, and the poem he offered in the Chancellor's 
competition was in ter%a rima^ the metre of the Dtvina Commedia. 

I. witch elms. Or '* wych-elms", the Scotch variety, smaller 
than the English elm. " Wych " is "weak", and is apparently 
applied to trees with pendulous branches. Cf. Ode to Memory^ 
which also describes the lawn of Somersby rectory, as it ivas : for 
these trees were afterwards cut down. 

47. crimson-circled star. Before Venus, the evening star, 
had sunk into the sea, after sunset. Venus is supposed to be an 
off-shoot of the sun. 

The Friend's Character 

Tennyson's estimate of Hallam may seem exaggerated, until 
confirmed by independent testimony. Alford wrote : " Hallam was 
a man of wonderful mind and knowledge on all subjects, hardly 
credible at his age. ... I long ago set him down for the most 
wonderful person I ever knew. He was of the most tender, affec- 
tionate disposition." Memoir^ i, Gladstone, who was at Eton with 
Hallam, wrote, *' There was perhaps no one among those who were 
blessed with his friendship, . . . who did not feel at once bound 
closely to him by commanding affection, and left far behind by the 



rapid, full and rich development of his ever-searching mind." 
Memoir^ i, 299. 

I. Heart-affluence. " Power of rich discourse acquired in 
an intellectual home." Hallam's house, 67, Wimpole St., "the 
long unlovely street," was one of the most distinguished meeting- 
places for literary people in London. Miss Elizabeth Barrett, with 
her eccentric father, and grown-up brothers and sisters lived at 
No. 50. in the same street. 

3. critic clearness. " As a critic there was no one upon 
whose taste and judgment I had so great reliance. I never was 
sure that I thoroughly understood or appreciated any poem till I 
had discussed it with him." Letter of a friend, quoted in Remains 
in Ver%e and Prose of Arthur Hallam^ Preface, xxxiv. 

16. blind hysterics of the Celt. This is hardly just to 
France, and the principles of 1789 5 but it represents Tennyson's 
characteristic attitude towards any but the English form of freedom. 
See Dowden j Literary Studies, Mr. Tennyson, and Mr. Brown- 
ing. 

17. manhood fused. Chantrey's portrait bust of Hallam 
shows a singularly handsome and well-proportioned face. 

The Friend's Eloquence 

In the prefece to the Remains in Prose and Verse of Arthur 
Hallam, a personal friend writes, " There was ... no kind of 
discussion in which he did not take an active and brilliant part," 
and mentions *' his natural skill in the dazzling fence of rhetoric." 

Gentleman Defined 

The gentleman is especially an English ideal. Compare New- 
man's definition. The Idea of a Uni-versity, Discourse viii, 10, and 
Ruskin's in Modern Painters, Part ix, chap, vii. Of Vulgarity. 

Tennyson insists on the usual contrast between outward form and 
the inner reality. In Hallam the harmony between his real nature 
and outward manner was complete, politesse de coeur. 

3. a golden ball. The orb with Edward the Confessor's 
cross upon it, a symbol of universal sovereignty, held in a king's 



272 jliote0 

left hand as the sceptre in the right. See the great seals of the 
early English kings. 

The Friend's Letters 

With the vanishing of our beloved dead into the grave, every- 
thing that holds the impress of their personality becomes precious. 
The room, the bed, the vacant chair remind us of our loss, but 
the pang they give us we would not put aside. Above all, the 
letters of the departed are treasured, for there are the very words, 
the familiar turns of expression they used in life. The vanished 
hand crossed these very characters, passed over these very pages. 
As we read them, we almost hear the sound of the voice that is 
still. The words seem to live. 

This elegy has two pictures, a night-piece and the coming of the 
dawn, both full of the soft, domestic charm of English landscape. 
Lines 35-44, describe the ecstatic state, which was no unfamiliar 
experience with Tennyson. 

41. iConian music. Eternal, everlasting music. Cf. In 
JHemortam, xxxv, 10. 

" The sound of streams that swift or slow 
Draw down the Ionian hills." 

45. Vague words. The artist struggles with the same diffi- 
culty as the metaphysician, the difficulty of expressing thought, 
which is plastic, in words, which are rigid. Cf. Dream of Fair 
Women, last stanza : and Stevenson, Technical Elements of Style 
in Literature. 

Nature Pitiless 

"The hope of immortality still farther discredited," or "the 
hideous 'No' of Nature." F. W. Robertson. Compare Dar- 
win, Origin of Species, cap. x. On Extinction, but this work did 
not appear until nine years after In Memoriam. Tennyson was early 
familiar with these new scientific conceptions, saw their full import, 
gave poetical yet accurate expression to them, and yet his faith 
survived, if somewhat baffled and broken-winged. The gist of this 
*' elegy " is that Nature offisrs no hope of immortality. Man shall 



ipote0 273 

vanish utterly from the planet like the countless races that have 
preceded him. If this be true, man's life with all his striving is 
meaningless. The monstrous animals of primeval times struggling 
for existence were more comprehensible. 

26. O for thy voice. The voice of his friend. 

The Hearts Revolt 

"The atheism of the Understanding is annihilated by the Heart. 
We feel God — we do not find him out." F. W, Robertson. 
** The heart asserts God in face of the doubt of the sense and the 
intellect." King. It is to be understood as a summary of the 
poet's experience, as given at length in previous poems. The first 
stanza grapples with the difficulty of rendering the conception of 
God in terms of human thought. The second means God is not 
to be found in Nature or philosophy. In the third the decay of 
faith is likened to the crumbling of the coast-line into the ocean. 
Arnold compares it to the ebbing of the tide all round the world. 
If then the temptation comes to part with faith, the heart with its 
knowledge of its own experience protests with heat like a man in an- 
ger. This idea he at once withdraws and modifies, as being an almost 
arrogant assertion of strength. In his humility, he says " I am but 
a child crying for my Father," as before he wrote 

" So runs my dream : but what am I I 

An infant crying in the night : 

An infant crying for the light : 
And with no language but a cry." LIV. 

Critics have sneered at this attitude of the poet's, as indicative of 
weakness : but the idea is Christ's teaching, man must become as a 
little child, if he is to enter the kingdom. 

21. And what I am. '* Originally written ' what I seem,' 
* beheld again what is ' that is, God, real being, as distinguished 
from phenomenal existence, * and no man understands,' the in- 
comprehensible One ; * and out of darkness ' in which He is 
shrouded, ' came the hands that reach through nature, moulding 
men.' We see His working, we see not Him." King. 



2 74 ipiotesf 

The Goal of III 

"111" or "evil" is here a term of wide meaning, further 
illustrated by the poet in the phrases of lines 3 and 4. — *' pangs of 
nature," all forms and phases of physical suffering, 

" Ache of the birth, ache of the helpless days 

Ache of hot youth, and ache of manhood's prime. 
Ache of the chill grey years and choking death' — 

*• sins of will," all moral evils, — "defects of doubt," "defects 
growing out of doubt, or perhaps even constituted by doubt ' * 
(King), — " taints of blood," those fatal weaknesses born with 
the child that no skill or wisdom can counteract. In face of the 
great mysteries of evil, sin and suffering, the poet utters the hope 
that good will come of it all, and is for the time a glorious opti- 
mist, dreaming a dream of good. 

The Larger Hope 

The key to this poem seems to me to be in the second line, 
** No life " being equivalent to "no single life," and, in opposition 
to other interpreters, I think the connection with the preceding 
poem is most intimate. " We trust " that not a moth or a worm 
perishes in vain. The argument continues, Does not this ' * wish ' ' 
spring from what is nearest the divine in our human nature ? But 
nature in her carelessness of life seems to contradict this view. The 
study of Nature then shakes his faith, and in the darkness (inabil- 
ity to understand and reconcile the two), he would come near to 
God, and trust even faintly the larger hope, the hope for all. 

God^ Nature and the Friend 

I do not find that, anywhere in this poem, the poet thinks of 
his friend as lost, as a mere influence, not a surviving personality. 
Here after the storrn he has reached the calmer air. He has 
attained to a working philosophy of life. His friendship has been 
a prevailing influence in bringing this about, and colors his concep- 
tion of God and the universe. 



Jliote0 275 

Supplicatio. 

I. O living will. The poet stated himself that he means 
here " free will in man." Will is " the essence of human person- 
ality which will endure, 

" When all that seems shall suffer shock.' 

The Poet summoned this "living will" to ''rise like a foun- 
tain" in "the spiritual rock," with obvious reference to 1 Cor. 
10: 4, "flow thro' our deeds and make them pure," so that 
with action and character purified, our cry may rise from these 
earthly scenes 

" To One that with us works." King. 

II. Until we close. At death. Death does not lead to 
Nirvana, the absorption of all souls in God (see poem xlvii), but 
to closer union with our beloved dead and even those we leave be- 
hind, in God. 

Maud 

The germ of this poem is to be found in xxvi, i. " O that 
'twere possible, &c.," which were written in 1834, and published 
in The Tribute, 1837. It was also printed at the end oi The Annual 
Register for 1837. Aubrey de Vere writes, Memoir, i, 379, " It 
had struck him, in consequence, I think, of a suggestion made by 
Sir John Simeon, that, to render the poem fully intelligible, a preced- 
ing one was necessary. He wrote it ; the second poem too required 
a predecessor ; and thus the whole work was written, as it were, 
backivards.^^ 

Strange to say, Maud was severely criticised upon its appearance, 
and there are still those who regard it as a " splendid failure. " This 
poem was one of Tennyson's favorites, and often chosen by him for 
reading aloud. The adverse criticism surprised and annoyed him, and 
not a few of his admirers. The lover is the only son of a ruined 
gambler and suicide. Of a fine-strung, sensitive nature, he has grown 
up alone ; everything in his environment he sees reminds him of his 
father's tragic end. He is a student and has never mingled with the 
world. What wonder that the sweet bells are jangled ? Brimley, one 



276 Jl^ote0 

of Tennyson's best critics, pertinently remarks, '*To strong men, the 
world is not made bitter by a father's ruin and suicide, by the pre- 
valence of meanness and cruelty, by contemptuous neglect and gen- 
eral absence of sympathy." The hero is conscious of his own fail- 
ings, just as Hamlet is, and longs for betterment. " O for a man 
to arise in me ! " he cries. He is on the verge of madness or self- 
destruction when Maud crosses his path. At once the real strength 
of his character is revealed ; he shows that he has an infinite capa- 
city for loving, and one lyrical outburst after another opens up depth 
within depth of pure, tender, passionate devotion. No wonder 
Maud loved a man capable of homage so perfect, so sincere, so 
delicate as breathes in "Come into the Garden," and *' I have 
led her home." For a time all goes well j he passes from doubt 
and jealousy to happy assurance of his love returned j and then, 
in a moment, the desire of his eyes is taken from him and by 
his own fault. Then his brain turned. Maud's lover is a modern 
Romeo. Shakspere's hero also is " easily moved to hatred, de- 
spair, ecstasy, jealousy, rage and madness," and yet he awakens 
love in the breast of the peerless Juliet, out-jests the prince of 
wits, Mercutio, and slays fierce Tybalt, the most accomplished 
swordsman in Verona. Mr. W. H. Mallock seems to be the only 
critic of note who has perceived the real significance of Maud. 
This much-abused age of ours, this imitative, faithless, materialistic 
age, has one excellence no other age possessed. Maud is a revela- 
tion how a mere modern can love : it is the revelation of a purer, 
more beautiful, more tender, more strong and more consuming 
passion than any former time dreamed of. The reverence for the 
beloved woman is holier than ever before. And Maud illustrates 
this, for whatever may be said of the lover's personal character, 
nothing can be brought against the character of his love. Even the 
shadow of an impure thought never crosses his mind. His passion 
transforms and transfigures him ; out of weakness it makes him 
strong. Granted his nature is diseased, such love is an accident in 
it. In strong natures, such as the heroes of Macleod of Dare and 
Kenelm Chillingly y love manifests the same refinement, purity and 
power. 

This section of the poem (xviii) reveals the lover's rapture, 
upon the knowledge that his love is returned. He has led Maud 



iPotes? 277 

home to the Hall, and at midnight he lies beneath the cedar-tree 
within the sound of the sea, trying to realize his happiness. 

18. dark cedar. There was a famous cedar of Lebanon in 
the grounds at Farringford. 

36. a sad astrology. The new conception of the insignifi- 
cance of the earth, a mere grain of sand in the midst of suns and 
systems in the waste spaces of the universe, and consequently, the 
insignificance of man lay on Tennyson like a frost. Cf. f^astness. 

55. like men in drinking-songs. In perhaps the most 
famous of drinking-songs, the song of Bishop Golias, the thought 
of death is introduced into the first line. ' ' Mihi est propositum in 
taberna mori." 

60. the dusky strand of Death. The thought of death, 
of the end, of separation mingled with the thought of love, makes 
love more precious. The metaphor is taken from rope-making. 
The cordage for the Royal Navy was distinguished by strands of 
different colors to prevent or detect theft. 

76. ye meanwhile. The stars are apostrophized. 

RlZPAH 

See 2 Samuel, xxi, 8-10. " But the king took the two sons of 
Rizpah . . . and he delivered them to the Gibeonites, and they 
hanged them in the hill before the Lord. . . . And Rizpah the 
daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her on the 
rock, from the beginning of harvest until water dropped upon them 
out of heaven, and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest on 
them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night. ' ' 

Tennyson's own account of the source of this poem is in the 
Memoir, 11, 250. Phcebe Hessell, an old character of Brighton, 
who had been apparently a private soldier, "obtained such informa- 
tion as led to the conviction of Rooke and Howell for robbing the 
mail, a circumstance which made a considerable sensation at the 
close of the last century. They were gibbeted on the spot where 
the robbery was committed, and there is an affecting story con- 
nected with the body of Rooke. When the elements had caused 
the clothes and flesh to decay, his aged mother, night after night, 
in all weathers, and the more tempestuous the weather the more 



278 j^ote0 

frequent the visits, made a sacred pilgrimage to the lonely spot on 
the Downs, and it was noticed that on her return she always brought 
something away with her in her apron. Upon being watched it 
was discovered that the bones of the hanging man were the objects 
of her search, and as the wind and rain scattered them on the 
ground she conveyed them to her home. There she kept them, 
and, when the gibbet was stripped of its horrid burden, in the dead 
silence of the night she interred them in the hallowed enclosure 
of Old Shoreham Churchyard. What a sad story of a Brighton 
Rizpah ! ' ' 

Of this poem, Swinburne wrote in 1881 : "Never since the 
beginning of all poetry were the twin passions of terror and pity more 
divinely done into deathless words or set to more perfect and pro- 
found magnificence of music : never more inseparably fused and 
harmonized into more absolute and sublime identity." Tennyson 
and Musset, Fortnightly Revieiv, Feb. 1881. 

I. the wind over land. As a child in Somersby rectory, 
Tennyson made his first line of verse, lisping in numbers, * ' I hear 
a voice that's speaking in the wind." 

16. night has crept. A common figure for death. ** The 
night cometh when no man can work." 

38. all the ships. The Downs are high and bare, and the 
gibbet was close to the narrow seas, which are always thronged with 
shipping. 

54. they had moved in my side. Swinburne writes : 

" Not one (of all the great poets) . . . has ever touched the very 
deepest and finest chord on the lyre of the human spirit with a 
diviner power, a more godlike strength of tenderness than Mr. 
Tennyson has touched it here. Nothing more piteous, more pas- 
sionate, more adorable for intensity of beauty, was ever before this 
wrought by human cunning into the likeness of such words as 
words are powerless to praise." Tennyson and Musset ^ Fortnightly 
RevieiVy Feb. 1881. 

The Revenge 

First appeared in The Nineteenth Century in 1878. The first line 
" was on my father's desk for years, but he finished the ballad at 



jl^otesf 279 

last at once in a day or two." Memoir, 11, 142. The probable 
date of composition is 1873. 

The sub-title *' A Ballad of the Fleet " might seem to imply that 
Grenville's exploit lived in the popular memory ; but after the cele- 
bration by Raleigh, Markham, Bacon and Linschoten at the time, 
this doughty deed was forgotten until the mid nineteenth century. 
Apparently the national heart was more deeply stirred by the tale 
of the wounded Sidney handing the water to the dying soldier, and 
remembered his courtesy better than Grenville's dying vaunt. In a 
thousand years of the rough island story, there are many victories, 
many glorious defeats to keep in mind. 

Grenville belonged to a famous Cornish family which has given 
many sons to the land and sea service of their country. As Froude 
has shown, the backbone of the British resistance to Spain lay in 
the western counties, the home of the sea-dogs. In ff^estivard Ho ! 
Kingsley softens the traits of Grenville's character : he was an 
extreme type of a fierce, indomitable race, the Englishmen of the 
Elizabethan era. He was a very wealthy land-owner ; but he pre- 
ferred a life of action to a life of pleasure. 

The original source is A Report of the Truth of the Fight about 
the lies of Azores this last Sommer betivixt the '■^Reuenge''^ and an 
Armada of the King of Spaine, by Sir Walter Raleigh, Grenville's 
own cousin. This tract appeared anonymously in November, 1 59 1; 
Hakluyt reprinted it in 1599 and credited it to Raleigh. The fight 
took place on the 3i8t of August, O. S., or the loth of Septem- 
ber, N. S. Grenville was freely blamed for needless foolhardiness 
in losing a Queen's ship, and a commission was appointed to inquire 
into the circumstances of his death. Raleigh's tract is a defense of 
his friend and kinsman. Other contemporary versions are Gervase 
Markham's poem, The Most Honorable Tragedie of Sir Richard 
Grinuiky Knight (1595) and Linschoten^ s Discours of Voyages 
( 1 596-1 598). Modern versions are Froude, Short Studies, i, 
England'' s Forgotten ff^orthies •, Linton, Great Odds At Sea i 
Massey, Sir Richard Grenville^ Last Fight j Stevenson, The 
English Admirals. 

The whole transaction has been carefully studied by a most com- 
petent authority, Mr. Julian S. Corbett. From a military point of 
view, no end was attained by the sacrifice of The Re-venge and her 



28o 0Ott^ 

crew. Grenville's duty as a naval commander was to get his sick 
men on board and rejoin his squadron with all speed. If six ships 
against fifty-three was too great odds, one against fifty-three was 
sheer madness. Grenville could have easily made his escape, for 
TAe Revenge, a first-class 'Mong ship " of the new English model, 
could easily outsail the lumbering Spanish galleons, but he chose 
deliberately to sail in the opposite direction through a gap in the 
Spanish fleet which was approaching in four divisions. His motive 
appears to have been pure bravado, like Monson in his single vessel 
backing his topsail and waiting for the three Spaniards detached from 
the convoy of the plate fleet to take him ; but they did not accept 
his insolent challenge. It was like Raleigh leading the van into 
Cadiz harbor in 1596, disdaining to answer the flanking fire of the 
whole galley squadron except by a blare of his trumpets, while he 
steered the fVar Sprite straight at the " great San Philip,''^ resolved 
"to be revenged for the Revenge." 

Corbett sums up : "So perished the last of a race of soldiers of 
the sea to whom our naval tradition's owe a golden legacy. Strongly 
as we may condemn the obstinate presumption to which the * Re- 
venge ' was sacrificed, it is certain that unless an officer be touched 
with a breath of the spirit that day on the ' San Paolo ' in the midst 
of the enemy, he is unfit to command a ship-of-war. Without a 
glow of its fire, ships become but counters and tactics sink to ped- 
antry." Drake and the Tudor Navy, 11, 387. 

7. six ships of the line. The term arose much later, when 
instead of single ship actions, squadrons and fleets manoeuvred and 
fought in " line ahead." A ship of the line was a ship fit to lie in 
such a line, a ship of the largest size with the heaviest armament, a 
** first-rate. ' ' The Revenge was among the best of the Queen's ships, 
measuring 500 tons, carrying a crew of 250 men, and very heavy 
batteries. She was Drake's flagship all through the fight with the 
Armada. 

12. these Inquisition dogs. As Froude points out {Eng- 
lish Seamen in the Sixteenth Century), it was the militant Protestant 
minority of the southern ports that felt the power of Spain most 
heavily and finally dragged the reluctant Queen and government into 
war. Grenville's speech represents their temper and their attitude to 
the great Catholic world power. 



jpotesf 281 

57. Ship after ship. Froude and Tennyson exaggerate, 
though no exaggeration is necessary. Of the fifty-three ships in 
the Spanish fleet, a large number were victuallers. Still The Re- 
'venge was actually engaged with fifteen ships, carrying 5000 men. 
Besides beating off countless boarding attacks, she sank two ships 
alongside ; another was so badly mauled that she sank in St. Mi- 
chael's bay, and a fourth was beached to save her crew. Such a 
record is to be explained by the skill of the English seamen-gunners 
and the weight of The Re'venge''s primary batteries. See the discus- 
sion in the Diet. Nat. Biog.^ s. n. 

Nothing can be added to Bacon's comment on the great sea- 
fight. It is ' memorable even beyond credit, and to the height of 
some heroical fable.' 

89. Sink me the ship. Apparently an impossible order, if 
the powder was exhausted : but perhaps Sir Richard did not know. 
Stevenson (^Britiih Admirals) suggests scuttling ; but that would be 
a slow process, and The Re-venge had six feet of water in her hold 
already. 

loi. I have fought. Grenville's last words are reported by 
Linschoten, who was at Tercera during the action : but they are 
plainly dressed up. The significant phrase is *'that hath done his 
dutie, as he was bound to do." One thinks of dying Nelson in the 
cockpit of the Victory^ with his backbone shot through, repeating 
** Thank God, I have done my duty." 

112. ■wind from the lands. The West Indies. Raleigh 
says the wind was W. N. W. 

The Spinster's Sweet-Arts 

No later Thackeray has included Tennyson in another series of 
" English Humorists," but his " rich humor " was an essential part 
of his personality, as his son notes in the preface to the Alemoir. 
It is manifested constantly in his life and work. Locker-Lampson, 
a good judge, who knew him well, wrote: "His humor is of 
the dryest, it is admirable. Did anyone ever make one laugh more 
heartily than Alfred Tennyson ? He tells a story excellently, and 
has a catching laugh." Memoir, 11, 80. The poet who could per- 
suade the London lady that the common English daisy was a rare 



282 jliotefif 

rhododendron which grew only in the Isle of Wight must have had 
plenty of fun in him. In such interpretations of English rustic life 
as the two '* Northern Farmers," '* The Church- Warden," *' The 
Northern Cobbler," he shows not only complete comprehension, 
but the most genial sympathy. The *' spinster " herself has been 
charged with selfishness, by some ungallant or envious critics, most 
unjustly. In view of the perils of marriage, (Stevenson called it 
*'so much more dangerous than the wildest sea") which she 
discerned so clearly, who shall venture to call her unwise ? 

4. fellers. This is also the term used by the fine ladies in Sir 
Charles Grandison for their admirers. 

106. my oan fine Jackman. The clematis Jackmanii, with 
large purple blooms. 

To Virgil 

First appearance in TAe Nineteenth Century, September, 1882. 
Virgil died at Tarentum (or Brundusium) on Sept. 21, a. d. 82. 

The poem is a series of apostrophes forming a single sentence of 
homage, " I salute thee." Poets have written the most memorable 
criticism on poets, certainly the criticism that is best remembered. 
Such phrases as Spenser's on Chaucer, ** well of English undefiled," 
or Jonson's on Shakspere, "He was not for an age but for all 
time," or Byron's on Crabbe, "Nature's sternest painter yet the 
best," contain literary judgments of real value. A very striking 
instance is Mrs. Browning's Masque of Poets, in which she reviews 
the poets of the world. This * ' appreciation ' ' of Virgil belongs to 
the class of metrical criticism. Tennyson was a lifelong student and 
admirer of the classic poet and resembled him in his patriotism, his 
genuine love of country life, in his tenderness and reverence, and in 
the refinement, learning and finish of his workmanship. The first 
stanza touches on the main topics of the ^neid, the third on the 
themes of the Georgics, the fourth refers to the first and the sixth 
Eclogues and the fifth to the fourth Eclogue, the sixth and seventh 
to the famous speech of Anchises in the sixth book of the ^neid, 
beginning ** Principio, ccelum, ac terras camposque liquentes." The 
poem is fiall of reminiscences and variations of Virgilian phrases and 
echoes of Virgilian music. 



j^otesf 283 

3. he that sang. Hesiod. 

6. in a lonely V70rd. Tennyson instanced ** cunctantem '* 
in y^neid, vi, 211 as an example [Memoir, 11, 385). It refers to 
the golden branch, which /Enas broke off and took to the Sibyl. 

11. Universal Nature. A Tennysonian version of 

*' totamque, infusa per artus 
Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet. " 

^n. vi, 726 f. 

12. majestic in thy sadness. Excellent examples are the 
questions of ^neas, in the under- world. 

O pater ! anne aliquas ad coelum hinc ire putandum est 
Sublimes animas, iterumque in tarda reverti 
Corpora ? quae lucis miseris tarn dira cupido ? 

^«. vi, 719-721. 

14. Golden branch. Doing for us what the golden bough 
(see note to 1. 6) did for ^neas, leading us magically through a 
dim by-gone world. 

18. Island sunder'd once. Cf Eclogue i, 63. 

Et, penitus toto divisos orbe, Britannos. 

19. I salute thee, Mantovano. Virgil was born at Andes 
in the district of Mantua. In the second canto of the Inferno^ 
Dante addresses Virgil, '* O anima cortese Mantovana." There is 
a peculiar bond between England and Italy. English poets, from 
Chaucer and Milton to Byron and the Brownings, have visited Italy, 
have drawn their inspiration from Italy, have lived and died in 
Italy. Modem Italy remembers still with gratitude England's de- 
cisive interference on her behalf in the great crisis of her struggle for 
unity and freedom. Florence treasures the dust of Elizabeth Barrett 
Browning. Rome holds the graves of Keats and Shelley, 

Vastness 

Appeared first in Macmillan s Magazine^ Nov. 1885. The 
statements in the Memoir, 11, 314, 343 are contradictor)'. 

The poem is a summary of human activity, good and bad, on 



284 jliote0 

the planet, a question and an answer. The traditional " geocentric " 
theory of the universe, which prevailed until the middle of the 
nineteenth century, seemed to be utterly discredited by the new con- 
ceptions of natural science. Our planet was dispossessed from its former 
place of importance : with the planet's importance went the import- 
ance of man her inhabitant. The universe increased immeasurably 
in extent, and the dignity of the human race diminished swiftly in 
the inverse ratio. In Maud the lover apostrophizes the stars, — 

** Cold fires, yet with power to burn and brand 
His nothingness into man." 

This ** nothingness of man " finds noble expression in Steven- 
son's Pul'vis et Umbra. It seems to lie like an incubus on much of 
Tennyson's later poetry, to pain and to oppress him. In this poem 
after facing the question fairly, " What is the meaning of life, if men 
perish like the beasts ? ' ' the poet finds his answer in the instinc- 
tive revolt of the heart. Love cannot be persuaded that the Grave 
is the End. The answer in the final line was originally given to a 
second speaker. By *' him " can Hallam be meant ? 

Tennyson's MS. note is " What matters anything in the world 
without full faith in the Immortality of the Soul and of Love ?'* 
Memoir ^ li, 343. 

Merlin and the Gleam 

Of " Merlin and the Gleam" written in August, 1889, he 
says : "In the story of Merlin and Nimue I have read that 
Nimue means the Gleam — which signifies in my poem the higher 
poetic imagination. Verse iv is the early imagination, Verse v 
alludes to the Pastorals." Memoir^ 11, 366. 

Tennyson had the ideal career of the poet. Art is long and life 
is short ; but Tennyson was given length of days to mature his 
powers and learn his craft. He went if not from strength to 
strength, at least from one variety of excellence to another. This 
poem is the artist's autobiography, his career reviewed by himself. 
Popular interpretation would make ' ' The Gleam ' ' the ideal, and, 
as poems have sometimes more in them than the authors know, 
perhaps this is not wrong. 



jliote0 285 

Crossing the Bar 

Tennyson's swan song. " Written in my father's eighty-first 
year, on a day in October, when we came from Aldworth to Far- 
ringford. Before reaching Farringford he had the Moaning of the 
Bar in his mind, and after dinner he showed me this poem written 
out. 

** I said, ' That is the crown of your life's work.' He answered, 
* It came in a moment.' He explained the 'Pilot' as 'that 
Divine and Unseen Who is always guiding us. ' 

" A few days before my father's death he said to me : * Mind 
you put " Crossing the Bar" at the end of all editions of my 
poems.' " Memoir, 11, 366 f. 

8. Turns again home. The first two stanzas express the 
natural desire for euthanasia, which in Tennyson's case was so 
amply fulfilled. Here once more in literature recurs the old idea that 
a fair death is parting even at the turning of the tide. So Falstaff 
passed like a chrisom child ; and faithful, homely Barkis. One 
must have lived beside tidal water as Tennyson did and learned 
its moods to appreciate fully this figure. After the lull of "slack 
water ' ' comes the distinct change of note in the lapping on the 
shingle. The ebb has begun. It is the ebb that helps the ship out 
of harbor and out to sea. 



%ntitv to fim Lfnesi 

Pagb 
As thro' the land at eve we went (^TAe Falling Out — 

TAe Princess) 133 

At Flores in the Azores, Sir Richard Grenville lay {TAi 

Revenge) 201 

Break, break, break (Break, Break, Break) 132 

Bury the great Duke (^Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wel- 
lington) 142 

By night we lingered on the lawn {Tht Friend's Letters — 

In Memoriam) 181 

"Courage!" he said, and pointed toward the land {The 

Lotos-Eaters) 47 

Dear friend, far off, my lost desire (The Friend — The Heart 

of All Things) 17a 

Deep on the convent-roof the snows (5r. ^^nw'^i;*) . . 107 
Glory of warrior, glory of orator, glory of song (Wages) . 166 
Heart-Affluence in discursive talk [The Friend's Character) . 177 
Home they brought her warrior dead ( The Call to Life — The 

Princess) 138 

I built my soul a lordly pleasure-house ( The Palace of Art) . 3 3 
I had a vision when the night was late ( The Vision of Sin) . 122 
I have led her home, my love, my only friend ( The Happy 

Lover — Maud) 190 

I past beside the reverend walls (College Rt-visited — In 

Memoriam) 173 

I read, before my eyelids dropt their shade (A Dream of 

Fair Women) 56 

I send you here a sort of allegory (To — ) 32 

In her ear he whispers gaily (The Lord of Burleigh) 114 

It little profits that an idle king (Ulysses) 104 

Many a hearth upon our dark globe sighs after many a van- 

ish'd face ( Vastness) 222 



288 ^nm to t^ie iFir0t ilinefif 

Milk for my sweet-arts, Bess ! for it mun be the time about 

now {^The Spinster'' s Siveet-Arts — Tiresias) . . . . 210 

My good blade carves the casques of men (&'r Galahad) , 109 

O living will that shalt endure {^SuppUcatio — In Memoriam) 189 

O Love, what hours were thine and mine {^The Daisy) . . 161 
O Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying South (North and South 

— The Princess) 136 

O well for him whose will is strong ! (^JVill) 165 

O young Manner (Merlin and the Gleam) 226 

Oh yet we trust that somehow good (The Goal of III — In 

Memoriam) 1 86 

On either side the river lie ( The Lady of Shalott) ... 14 

Roman Virgil, thou that singest ( To Virgil) .... 220 

So all day long the noise of battle roU'd (Morte D^ Arthur) . 74 
* So careful of the Type ? ' but no (Nature Pitiless — In 

Memoriam) 1 84 

Strong Son of God, immortal Love (Love Victorious — In 

Memoriam) 1 70 

Sunset and evening star (Crossing the Bar) 232 

Sweet and low, sweet and low (Lullaby — The Princess) . 133 

Sweet Emma Moreland of yonder town (Edward Gray) . 112 
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean (Idle Tears — 

The Princess) 135 

That which we dare invoke to bless (The Heart's Revolt — 

In Memoriam) 185 

The churl in spirit, up or down ( * Gentleman ' defined — In 

Memoriam) 180 

The Danube to the Severn gave ( Burial at Clevedon — In 

Memoriam) 172 

The plain was grassy, wild and bare ( The Dying Sivan) . . 11 

The splendor falls on castle walls ( Bugle Song — The Princess) 134 
The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills and the 

plains (The Higher Pantheism) 167 

The wind that beats the mountain, blows (To y. S.) . . 70 
The wish, that of the living whole (The Larger Hope — In 

Memoriam) 187 

The woman's cause is man's ; they rise or sink (* Male and 

Female Created He Them' — The Princess) . . . . 138 



^xiOtx to tlje iFim Hine^ 289 

There is sweet music here that softer falls (^Choric Song^ . 49 
Their lies a vale in Ida, lovelier (CEnone) ;« . . . . 2i 
This morning is the morning of the day {mAc Gardener'' s 

Daughter; or The Pictures) 86 

Thy converse drew us with delight {The Friend's Eloquence 

— In Memoriani) 1 79 

Thy voice is heard thro' rolling drums ( The Call to War 

— The Princess) 137 

Thy voice is on the rolling air {God, Nature, and the Friend 

— In Memoriam) 1 88 

Wailing, wailing, wailing, the wind over land and sea 

{Rizpah) 194 

We left behind the painted buoy {The Voyage) . . . . 118 
Wheer 'asta bean saw long and mea liggin' 'ere aloan ? {The 

Northern Farmer) 155 

Where Claribel low-lieth {Claribel) I 

When the breeze of a joyful dawn blew free [Recollections of 

the Arabian Nights) 5 

Witch-elms that counterchange the floor {Holidays at 

Somersby — In Memoriam) 1 75 

With blackest moss, the flower-plots {Mariana) ... 2 

With Farmer Allan at the farm abode {Dora) .... 97 



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